


Spreading Your Wings

by The Raven Sennin (orphan_account)



Series: Naruto: Henshin [3]
Category: Naruto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-23
Updated: 2011-03-05
Packaged: 2017-10-14 22:48:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/154303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/The%20Raven%20Sennin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The journey home can often feel shorter than heading out. But when you have as much on your minds as Team Seven, you relish every step. Even as Uzumaki Naruto adjusts to her life long henge falling and her oddly comfortable relationship with Fabuki Haku, Uchiha Sasuke is still dealing with trying to think through his obsessions, and Haruno Sakura finds her resolve to protect her team mate tested. Even as the genin and nukenin travel under Hatake Kakashi and the legendary Jaraiya, players begin moving back home in Konoha... for the good and ill of the jinchūriki of the Kyūbi and her precious people.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. PREAMBLIC

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wren Truesong (waywren)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/waywren/gifts), [evilgenus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilgenus/gifts).



> My thanks to evil genus and Wren Truesong, for headcheck and beta help.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief note from the rambling man.

**SIGN POST ALONG THE WAY  
**

You are here.

  
 **DISCLAIMER**

The characters don't belong to me. I'm just trying to exercise the mad ideas they gave me.

 **STATEMENT**  
If you spot spelling errors, please do comment them to my attention. I'm dyslexic, proofing my own work can drive me nuts. Do note, dear reader, I am Canadian. I have humour and colour.

 **WARNINGS:**  
Bashing free zone. Yes, you'll see the bad side of people. But I don't hate on any characters. Seems a waste.

You can consider this a bit of a Senin take on Naruto-- that is, aiming for an older audience. A shade darker, a bit more complex...but not without humour. 

This will not be a mere retread of Kishimoto-sensei's work with Naruto having matching gender chromosomes.

Reviews welcome. Replies will come as I have time.

 **AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST** ,

Thanks to Evil Genius, Hokotu, Illyrya, Zuria, and Wren Truesong for the comments and support .

Though I do wish Zuria would STOP READING MY MIND.


	2. Take Off

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Kakashi launches his first salvo, a new business appears, a petition is filed, and Closeness is happening.
> 
> updated june 28th to hide suck.

**BUILDING BRIDGES**

They'd be able to go soon, and Naruto found herself having mixed feelings about that. On the one hand, it had been a good two weeks since Jiraiya had arrived after... the changes. She wanted to see her hometown and all her special people again. On the other...

Would Sakura-chan go back to treating her like crap once they hit Konoha's gates? Would the bastard stop smiling that small honest smile and talking the matter-of-fact talk about his feelings? Would Sensei stop helping her learn as much? Would Jiraiya-jiji just fuck off to wherever he had been the first eleven years or so of her life?

Would Haku-- no, that didn't bear thinking about.

And on the other other hand-- foot? No, it was hands that worried her, reminded her.

She looked down at a hand that was a touch more slender than it had been a week ago. How would her precious people react to her? She felt comfortable in this new skin, and that ease with which she adapted scared her a little. How would Iruka-sensei look at her now? How would Ayame and her father think of their favourite customer masquerading as a boy all these years? And the bakery--

"Naruto-nee!"

Naruto blinked, and smiled at the young boy before her. "Inari! What's up, kiddo?"

"Me and Haku-san are going to go fishing, and since its Sakura and Sasuke's turn to watch Grandpa work on the bridge, I thought you might like to come!"

Naruto smiled. Fishing was something she had known how to do since that one time she'd been turned out of the orphanage and spent a day and a half in one of the more vibrant training grounds... but she had never done it for fun before.

"Got another pole, there?"

"Here," Hakun said, coming up behind them, passing her a fishing rod that was luckily just a newer model of the second hand one she had at home. He smiled that small smile at her, and she knew she was blushing.

Suddenly, she found herself not caring about what ifs.

"So, Inari-kun..." she said, giving him the patent pending Uzumaki Fox Grin, "you must know all the best fishing holes, y'know?"

The dark haired boy grinned and with a whoop shouted, "Follow me!" and took of running, one hand holding his hat to his head.

With a chuckle-- and even now, Naruto found she chuckled rather than giggled-- she took off after him. "C'mon, Hakun! I'm gonna catch a fish as long as my arm and cook it up for dinner tonight! Believe it!"

Without looking back, Uzumaki Naruto somehow knew her recently betrothed was keeping up with her. And then she yelped happily as he picked her up, and suddenly she was on his back and Inari was in his arms, and they were flying across Wave's landscape, Inari laughing and shouting directions, with Naruto holding on tight.

 _Oh please,_ she thought. _Don't let me lose this._

* * *

 **SENDING OUT SIGNALS**

 _That should be Minato-sensei carrying you, Naruto,_ Kakashi thought a bit bitterly from a distance away. _Or at least he should be watching you with me and Kushina-sama._

He knew Jiraiya was shadowing the trio, so he felt no need to tag along. He'd already run a few errands earlier to finish off a personal mission of the last few weeks, so he was taking care of other matters. He looked down at the blank scroll beside the full one on the ground, did a quick set of seals, and double checked the copy the technique had made on the blank. He set it with the eleven other copies, one unique message for his Hokage, and a more official document. He nodded. All the missives were placed in a storage scroll, and a trigger set to release each-- a trick Minato-sensei had insisted Kakashi learn after poor Pakkun had nearly passed out during one busy day of missives.

The fact he had made one of his kawaii genin write part of the official document without knowing what it was for was... admittedly a little underhanded. But he was Konoha's legendary Copycat-nin. Underhanded, he was good at. In a flash, seals were formed and Pakkun summoned.

"A list. And letters. Deliver them in order, and Jiraiya is not in the loop for this," Kakashi said.

"Thank Kami," Pakkun said.

"But, in this case... you need to know the contents."

Pakkun scratched behind his left ear, and then gave him a look. "That's a bit unusual, boss."

"Yes," Kakashi agreed. "But you'll understand once you know."

He set the scroll before his messenger and unrolled it. With a "ruff" a pair of glasses appeared on the ninken's face.

"Bless those Inuzuka vets. I bet Sakura would love to see you in those," Kakashi said. "Very cute."

"It must never happen..." Pakkun growled absently as he started to read, and then stopped suddenly with a yipe of surprise. Kakashi could guess what had startled the ninken, but let him finish reading. When Pakkun was done, he looked up at Kakashi with his head cocked to one side.

"Pakkun. You keep telling me, Konoha--"

"Has been off since your sensei died, yeah. I just..." At first Kakashi thought the ninken was amused. Then he felt a little note of discomfort as he realized the dog was proud.

"Alright. So you'll--"

"Gimme the damn list, you idiot."

Kakashi grinned, and unrolled the scroll.

Pakkun looked it over carefully, and with a jerk of his head, the glasses disappeared. "First the ramen stand, then the compound, and so on. Hokage last. Gotcha. I'll keep it down low."

Kakashi reached over and scratched the dog's head. "Thanks, old friend."

"Meh, I'm bored anyways," Pakkun said with a good natured grumble. "Kakashi?"

"Mm?"

Pakkun gave a pleased pant. "Thanks for not being left behind this time."

Kakashi pulled his mask back on as the ninken dashed off, and headed off toward where he felt the chakra signatures of Haku and Naruto at a leisurely pace, a copy of _Toad, Slug, Monkey_ in hand. After all, Jiraiya was a powerful ninja. Waving an Icha-Icha he insisted his god daughter was too young to be exposed to would spoil the fun. Even if she was already a little pervert.

* * *

 **JUSTICE'S SCALES TIP CLOSER TO BALANCE**

Hyuuga Hiashi had not been to Konoha's finest ramen stand since two of his dearest friends had died, but this was his second visit today. During his first he had sat and ordered a bowl of miso ramen. When he was done, he had been presented with a scroll. He had read the scroll intently, nodded, and in one area noted a commitment, and further down signed it.

Now, he was revisiting it. He ordered the Pork Special Ramen, with a perfect cutlet and slices of boiled egg floating on top, fine green onion shavings and the purple spiralled seafood cakes that echoed the name he was meditating on...

Naruto.

He began to eat, every bite reminding him of words said, barbs traded, promises made. Promises he could now begin to keep-- and some that he sadly realized he'd compromised on keeping.

 _What would you think of me now, Denko-sama?_ he thought sadly.

Ichiraku Teuchi placed a scroll beside him. Hiashi finished his noodles and left the broth in the bowl to keep the cutlet and egg hot-- and how he had missed the fact that the etiquette of the ramen stand practically damned one slurp and eat quickly as the broth allowed to enjoy the noodles at their best!-- and consulted the scroll. He raised his eyebrows and looked up at Teuchi.

"Ah, you noticed. The Haruno didn't surprise me so much; she noticed Iruka signing and he let her read it."

Hiashi took the pork from his bowl and bit into it. "As fine as my first bowl. Mm. Hatake did give us that discretion. Her daughter is on his genin team. And she's spoken against harsh measures for the boy-- child-- in council..." Hiashi said, frowning. "That will take some getting used to. The scroll did make the revelation Uzumaki-san's. But, the other three...?"

Teuchi sighted. "He walked up while Anko-san was signing. I could... find no reason to stop him, Hiashi-Sama-- Hiashi-san," he corrected with a grin at the raised eyebrow his formality earned him. "Though he did get the boys to read it and advised them to sign only if they agreed..."

Hiashi finished the pork, and started to eat the egg-- mainly the whites, as he had allowed the yolks to separate into the broth, which he found lent a lovely aftertaste. He paused in his meal. "No, you did nothing wrong. He... actually seems to be limiting himself and those two children of his. Getting the younger one to write anything without at least one mention of... well..."

Teuchi smiled slightly as he nodded. "I've heard."

Hiashi drained his bowl. And even as he set it down, right on cue--

"I'm not interrupting, am I, Hiashi-san?"

Hiashi rose, nodded his thanks to Teuchi, and turned to the Hokage. He held out the scroll. "Petition. Please, do consider it, Sarutobi-sama."

And Hiashi turned and left, to the sound, after a moment, of the scroll being unrolled.

* * *

 **LEAVING THE LAND OF WAVES**

"The Zabuza Bridge," Naruto said. Then she smiled. "No, the Momochi Bridge!"

Slowly, Tazuna nodded. "He died a hero," the bridge builder said.

Naruto gave one of her sincere smiles, until she saw Hakun's face. The undisguised shock there made her stretch a hand behind her head. "Eh, unless Hakun, you feel--"

The hug had the same calming coolness that all Hakun's touches did. Part of her wondered how it'd feel sharing a bed with him in a few years. She would have asked, but Jiraiya was nearby, and he seemed to feel better thinking she was more innocent to such things than she was.

"That reminds me," Sensei said, pulling out a scroll. "Naruto, before we go, you need to sign this. Haku too."

Naruto frowned, but took the proffered pen and signed on one of the two lines above Kakashi's name. Hakun frowned when Sensei wouldn't let him unroll the scroll to read it, but Kakashi's even look got him to sign.

"Very good. Well, that simplifies things; the Hokage will definitely not allow the assets of a Konoha citizen to go unguarded."

"Assets...?" Naruto asked, eyes narrowing.

"The Shippuden Corporation. Formally the Gatou Corp," Kakashi said cheerily. "Jointly owned by you two-- I'm your proxy since it isn't strictly a ninja business. Some civilians won't acknowledge adulthood until you're actually eighteen or so, rather silly..." He gave an eye smile. "Call it my betrothal gift."

Naruto knew she looked like a idiot, eyes wide and mouth open. "Oi... Sensei..."

Kakashi was doing that thing where he pretended to not notice something he'd rather not deal with, looking around. "In fact, The Professor said he'd dispatch a team right away. Should have arrived. Shame. I was hoping they'd be here by now-- but maybe they'll meet us on the way--"

"YOSH! My Eternal Rival, did you expect us to not make the correct entrance?"

The two green clad figures seemed to come out of nowhere, with a shockingly white smile on each face.

"The Magnificent Green Beast of Konoha!" the elder of the two announced, gesturing dramatically before posing in what could only be called a "Strong Nice Guy Stance". "The Mighty Guy, Maito Gai!"

"His student on the Path of Hard Work," his younger clone said with a quick kata before dropping into a horse stance before his sensei, "Konoha's Beautiful Green Wild Beast, Rock Lee!"

"Dynamic Entry Jutsu!" the two chorused as they threw up their arms. A sunset-- perfect, like out of a movie-- appeared behind them for an instant.

"Oi... Naru-nee... they must be really powerful," Inari managed.

Kakashi leaned over. "I'm the only one that can put up with him as a rival," Sensei muttered.

Naruto and Inari's eyes grew even wider. "Wow..." they said together.

The young kunoichi arriving in their wake smiled weakly, even as the other boy in their group (a rather obvious Hyuuga) scowled. They were accompanied by a composed young man with dark hair that had a vague green tint Naruto recognized instantly.

The "Magnificent Beast" was giving the Hyuuga a look, and the pale eyed genin seemed to hold back a comment.

"Morning," the girl said. "I'm TenTen, this is Neji."

"I've... heard of you, Gai-sensei. I mean, from Kakashi-sensei and Jiraiya-jiji," Naruto said. Then, she grinned. "Hey, hey, Gai-sensei..."

"Oi!" Sakura said as she was pulled over to stand before the strange nin.

"Kakashi-sensei said you're really good at taijutsu, and Sakura-chan wants to get better, y'know-- ow!" she said, as Sakura got her arm free and bopped her team mate on the head. Naruto rubbed where impact was made, smiling wanly. "She can already hit really hard. Believe it... ow."

Gai looked around the group, interest sparking in his eyes. His gaze settled on Naruto. "Ah, Uzumaki-sama. Once we return to Konoha, I would gladly test the youthful flames of my rival's kohai! But first... I understand we are protecting your most youthful assets!"

Jiraiya sighed. "That... sounded off, Gai."

Gai turned, and his smile grew impossibly wider. "J-Jiraiya-sama?"

"Gai."

"JIRAIYA-SAMA!"

"Gai."

"JIRAIYA-SAMA!"

"Yes, Gai. Introduce your student, Gai."

"ROCK LEE!" Gai said, pointing excitedly. "JIRAIYA-SAMA!"

Rock Lee gasped. "The... Gamma-Sennin?"

"Hai!"

Rock Lee looked at the sage. "JIRAIYA-SAMA! GAI-SENSEI, JIRAIYA-SAMA!"

"ROCK LEE! JIRIAYA-SAMA!"

"Oh, knock it off and skip to where you both hug me," Jiraiya grumbled, but accepted the joint embrace with a grin. "I'm not doing this next time."

Gai just grinned again.

"Uzumaki?" Hyuuga Neji said with a smile that was just a touch to sharp and just polite enough. He pressed his luck even as Gai glared at him. "A relative of that orphan?"

"My betrothed and I have only recently come to own the Gatou Corporation of Wave," Hakun said, and there was that quiet, hunter's edge to his voice. "We are renaming it Shippuden, for reasons I think will be obvious."

Neji blinked.

"As to being related--"

"Inari, would you and the others give us a moment?" Naruto interrupted.

Inari looked at the serious expression on her face and nodded. "Of course, Naru-nee-san."

Naruto watched as the boy implored his fellow citizens back, and at Kakashi's nod of permission (and there was that smile again, what was she doing to be so proud of?), she looked back at Neji.

"I am not related to Naruto. I _am_ Uzumaki Naruto. I hold the Nine-Tailed Fox inside me. I'm not gonna treat you like a idiot, Hyuuga-san, you're smart and can read and find out the nuts and bolts when you have a minute. But as part of the seal the Yondaime used to trap the fox inside me, I was under a henge in case those that... didn't think he was that awesome... thought **I** was the fox."

Sakura all too lightly spoke from where she still stood to Naruto's left, "You should know, the law states that only those that know about this S-Class secret can discuss it, and only my team mate can disclose it to those that do not know."

Suddenly, Sasuke was at her right side, speaking with that detached and direct air Naruto had come to know was simply the Uchiha way. "The punishment for violating it is death. By order of the Hokage himself. Just so you are aware, Hyuuga-san. It is obvious Uzumaki trusts you discretion."

The fact that Sasuke of all people was defending her was likely why Neji took a sudden step back. Or maybe it was Hakun glaring at him over her shoulder, and oh, now she had to focus to get her knees to stay straight. Was it that chakra bound thing, or...?

 _No_ , Naruto thought, _it was the bond_ and _that my Hakun is sexy as hell_."

 _Three or four years_ , she chided herself. _You're only twelve_.

Gai-sensei suddenly grew very serious. "Your trust in us is heartening, Uzumaki-sama--"

"That's too much," Naruto said. "Please, Gai-sensei... my sensei calls me Naruto."

"Occasionally brat," Kakashi muttered from behind his notably not orange book.

Gai nodded, grinning again. "I believe you know Shintarou?"

"Yeah," Naruto said, frowning. "Oi, Shin-kun, why are you here?"

The young green-black haired man simply nodded. "Kogami-sama received word of your recent acquisition, and Kakashi asked if he could spare someone to help ensure the citizens of Wave can trust your fine venture... and who would stay within the prescribed limits of its operation."

"Oh, cool," Naruto said, nodding. Then she turned to her sensei.

"He'll run the corp and keep it legal," Kakashi clarified.

Naruto nodded, slowly this time. Then she met the Yakuza's gaze. "No mercenaries. At all."

"Gatou was using them as brute muscle," Hakun clarified. "We wish the Shippuden Corporation to... distance itself from such actions."

Shintarou nodded gravely. "I have been informed that the Hokage is sending enough nins to form a constabulary," he said, in that cool tough tone. "They will provide security to Shippuden and the locals, from which I will hire. As well, as a courtesy to ensure trade, I am told protecting the new bridge will be a priority. As well, the contract I have signed insures full statements will be forwarded to all parties involved--" He seemed to see past Naruto's steady nodding. "You will know how much money we have, and I will set it up so all our employees get paid and the company gets the money it needs to keep going. And, of course, you will receive your share of the profits."

While Shin-kun was explaining this, Kakashi had pulled Maito Gai aside. Apparently it was to give directions, because after a moment, Gai clapped Kakashi on the back, earning only a slight jerk of the shoulders, a raised eyebrow and a return to his book.

"YOSH! Lee, TenTen, Neji! We must proceed to Shippuden Headquarters so Shintarou-san can begin the most youthful pursuit of guarding Konoha's financial interests! Lee! You shall carry Shintarou-san again!"

"Yosh, sensei! And if I falter, I shall return to Konoha in the crab walk position, and beat you there!"

"ROCK LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

\---

 **WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, HAVING RECIEVED THE FOLLOWING FROM UZUMAKI NARUTO:**

I, Uzumaki Naruto, wish to inform you that I am the Jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tailed Fox, which was sealed in me by the Yondaime Hokage, Namikaze Minato. I was under a henge making me appear as a boy for my own protection. I am in fact a young woman. As I consider you a friend, I wish you to know ahead of time.

 _AND FURTHER, THIS FROM HATAKE KAKASHI:_

In order to calm Naruto during the aftermath of her lifelong henge failing, and to secure her betrothal to Fubuki Haku, an escapee from Mist's bloodline purge, some history Naruto was not formerly privy to was revealed to her by her god father, Gamma Jiraiya. In the process, she understood her heritage as the daughter of Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina. I, as her sensei, take full responsibility for any penalty under the Hokage's law for such.

 _DO AGREE TO THE FOLLOWING:_

1\. That Uzumaki-san's training has been compromised by a) the misplaced grudges of those that wish revenge on the fox and b) the good intentions of those who care for her.

2\. That those that would support her more have been hampered further by laws put in place to protect her.

3\. That such laws, while regretful now, were made in the spirit of her protection and thus, can be forgiven.

4\. That, however, this has led to a vicious cycle of Uzumaki-san not gaining the very skills she needs to be able to live without the protection of said laws, thus causing the continued existence of said laws.

5\. That while it is admirable that the Hokage and his core council have decided Uzumaki-san should not be raised as a weapon, she must still be prepared for life as a shinobi-- especially in light of her desire to follow in her father's footsteps.

 _AND, THEREFORE, WE ALSO AGREE, WITH APPROVAL OF THE HOKAGE SARUTOBI HIRUZEN-SAMMA, TO COMMIT TO THE FOLLOWING MEASURES:_

That Uzumaki-san is encouraged to continue to reveal her true nature to her peers, as she has already to her team mates;

That Hatake Kakashi is allowed to continue to train her and her team mates, as her parents wished;

That Uzumaki-san's betrothed is allowed entrance into the village, with Gamma Jiraiya-sama as his sponsor. Jiraiya-sama can vouch for Fubuki-san, and confirm that the two betrothed youths share a strong, mutual, and healthy chakra bond;

That Uzumaki-san and Fubuki-san's holdings in Nami no Kuni be lent the aide of willing shinobi, for the protection of their business and employees, as Uzumaki-san currently has no clan to draw on;

That she be educated in the workings of Konoha's Hokage Office and further that she learn the workings of the High, Clan, Shinobi, Merchant, and Civilian councils, in order to aid her both as the head of her parent's clans and a potential candidate for Hokage-- a position our current leader has shown he feels she has the potential for;

That a full investigation be launched into any and all complaints brought to her Clan Council Guardian, Hyuuga Hiashi-sama, in order to root out any and all smears and/or attempts to displace blame to Uzumaki-san;

That the ANBU are allowed to treat any infraction against Uzumaki-san as they would one against any other active shinobi;

That the current genin teams be allowed at least one day a week to meet in a group for cross training in their sensei’s' specialities, both to encourage each student's youthful dedication to their own unique abilities and to tear down the social barriers inadvertently created by our most noble intentions;

That merchants who artificially inflate their prices on a customer by customer basis be charged with false advertising-- not applying merely to Uzumaki-san, as several children of civilian birth experience the same in shinobi stores and civilian run stores favour those clans considered "prestigious";

That Uzumaki-san receive a full, honest assessment of her abilities and needs by a panel selected by the Hokage;

That Uzumaki-san is moved to more appropriate housing, or at least her current housing be upgraded to a more modern standard, and due consideration given to proximity to her betrothed;

also, that land is set aside for her and Fubuki-san to establish a home and clan compound on after marriage;

That both Naruto and her intended be given lessons in properly running said household, including whatever training in matters of budget, cooking, cleaning, and so on is required;

That free members of the Special jounin Teams and the ANBU be allowed to lecture the genin on their combined training days, so they may learn more about actual shinobi life;

That those of us with stories of her parents be allowed to share them.

SIGNED:

Hatake Kakashi

Hyuuga Hiashi

Kogami Kousei, signing for the Kogami Group

Morino Ibiki

Maito Gai

Sarutobi Asuma

Ichiraku Teuchi

Yagi Riyouki

Yagi Hatsumi

Saki Shinogu

Umino Iruka

Haruno Chika

Yuuhi Kurenai

Mitarashi Anko

Shimura Danzou

Shimura Shin

Shimura Sai

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well. I've just carpet bombed canon.
> 
> Care to guess who added each condition to the petition? Each right answer means points... and points mean prizes!
> 
> Gai's... is a freebie.


	3. FLY AWAY HOME

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sasuke must admit he still has issues, Naruto admits her worries, Sakura must admit her secret that she thought everyone forgot, Haku admits he's lost, a seal admits one, and everyone's gotta admit Jiraiya is bad-ass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor edits and such and corrections to stop a native Japanese speaker stop crying added on June 28, 2011.

**TRAINING BLUES**

"Stop!"

Haku watched carefully as Kakashi caught a wild punch from Sasuke and dispersed Naruto's remaining clone with an offhand backhand.

"Let go of my hand--"

"Why'd you do that, Kakashi-sensei? I was about to beat the bastard's ass but good! Believe it--"

"You were brawling," Kakashi said in a quiet, firm voice, and if Haku had any doubts the man was once ANBU, they were gone. "I have told you both; you learn nothing when you brawl." He released Sasuke's hand with a firm push. "Both of you, cool down and figure out why you keep backsliding. We're skipping jutsu training today.”

"Hn."

"Oh, what a load--"

"Would you like me to say, 'Until Konoha'? Because I'm sure that Sakura wouldn't mind the extra one on one time."

Sasuke muttered something and turned, stalking off into the trees around the campsite. Kakashi looked after him, brow furrowed.

"Kakashi-san," Haku said, rising from his seat by their tents and inclining his head in offer.

Kakashi nodded slowly and turned to Naruto as Haku set off after the Uchiha.

He found the Sharingan holder some distance away. The boy-- and at the moment Sasuke was very much a boy, not the future nin Haku had seen glimpses of-- stood in a laughable parody of stoicism, staring off into space.

It was child's play to ice under his feet, make him turn with a tossed stone, catch him as he slipped, and put him in an arm bar.

On his belly on the ground, the Uchiha struggled. "Let. Me. Go."

"You are a threat to my betrothed. Why should I let you live?" Haku asked. He was rather interested in the answer, actually. The real one.

So when Sasuke said, "Please, we both know you're using her to become a Konoha nin--" he felt it only proper to press his knee, hard, into the Uchiha's back.

"Sloppy," Haku said. "On the off chance such a blatant lie did set me off, your only gain is that I kill you and put you out of your misery."

"You'd never--"

"What?" Haku said, and let his voice get its coldest, mind bordering on the edge of the mu that killed all intent. He couldn't quite make it to mu yet, but Zabuza-sensei had praised him for how close he'd come. "I will not be bared from Konoha when you die. I know not of the reverence the Uchiha are held in there. I was merely defending myself when you persisted to attack. Isn't that right... Jiraiya-sama?"

The Sennin had let Haku sense him, of course. He emerged from the trees, a flat expression in contrast to his usual jovial look, and yes, this was true mu. No intent projecting at all.

"Personally, I'd just say you helped Hatake do his job. The Uchiha proved unstable so we sadly had to kill him."

"Kakashi is my--"

"Sensei, yes," Jiraiya-sama said. "Hold him up."

The fact that it was so easy to shift to a standing swan wing hold spoke as much to the Uchiha's current distraction as to Haku's skill. Jiraiya-sama leaned down slightly so he was eye to eye with Sasuke, and Haku felt the boy stiffen in his hold.

"Home truth time, Sasuke. Hatake was assigned to your team because he's ex-ANBU and uniquely suited to handling the issues your team has. They wanted someone to shock Sakura into tapping her potential as a ninja. They wanted Naruto to have a chance at real training with a man who took some of their rawest recruits and made them worth a mask. And yes, they wanted you to learn to use the Sharingan. But... there's another side to it."

Jiraiya-sama put his hands on the Uchiha's cheeks, and Haku's suspicions were confirmed when the Gamma-sennin said, "Don't look away, boy. It's time to face reality. You don't get to sulk your way through this one. Look-- Look at me or you are dead now."

He might have been pointing out an interesting tree.

"Good. Now listen. During the bell test, Hatake realized one core fact. You are one of the most outright suicidal dysfunctional genin teams ever. So he focused on his secondary mission profile-- protect Naruto and watch her seal until she could go on a trip with me, keep an eye on Sakura so she didn't die... and watch you to see if you'd gone bat shit on us. And if you have... kill you."

Sasuke was silent a moment. "Because... Konoha doesn't need another Itachi?"

"Yes. That simple. And you know I've considered whether it's worth dragging you back from the edge so many times over our brief acquaintance, Uchiha Sasuke. You've shown some promising signs, and some downright depressing ones. But one thing, one main thing is staying Hatake's hand. For now, it's keeping me from just taking you out and it's keeping Haku from removing you. For some goddamn reason, my god daughter considers you one of her-- what's that term you and Naruto use?"

Haku had to give a small smile, "Precious people, Jiraiya-sama."

"Right. She cares about you, Sasuke. But there's a piece of her that's been wondering if it's worth it. And if you keep pushing that-- well, Haku and I will get to you before Hatake does. Because we'd rather she hate us than loose a bit of her soul to you. And Konoha can loose the Sharingan for all I care. Because that young lady back there is _our_ precious person."

At Jiraiya-sama's nod, Haku let go and the two left him there with a swirl of leaves and a fine spray of mist.

A short distance away, they watched him stumble, blink, then sink to the ground, shuddering.

"He's been coddled too much," Haku noted, perching on a branch.

"Partly, but also more than that," Jiraiya-sama said feet and hands holding him to the tree in a pose that reminded Haku of a spider. "That coddling and any honest help people try and give him contradict his Uchiha upbringing. The very things he wants and needs are what he's convinced will make him weak, and he can't separate them from unwanted butt kissing. And part of him hasn't quite let go of the idea he has to hunt down his brother, who is perfect in his mind."

Haku nodded slowly and after a moment's thought, he looked at Jiraiya-sama, "We watch for now."

"Yes. And despite what I said, Hatake looses the arrow."

Haku nodded. It would not do to proceed improperly.

If Sasuke needed to die, there was no reason to deprive himself of a life with Naruto to do it.

* * *

Kakashi watched Naruto bite her lip a moment as they both sat by the fire.

"I'm sorry sensei-- and I know I’m not getting jujutsu training today but can I ask you about something else?"

At his genin's rushed need to cut off any protests, Kakashi smiled. "Alright. As long as it's not about jutsus," he said, raising a finger in mock warning.

Naruto seemed to take him seriously. "No! Nothing about jutsus!"

Kakashi nodded. "Then go ahead."

Naruto licked her lips. "You said a chakra bond, like me and Haku have, means we like to be close. And there's more to it."

Kakashi nodded. "And you want to know the more."

"Hai, sensei."

Kakashi thought a moment. "Well, first, you already have several chakra bonds..."

"Huh?"

Kakashi grinned. "Ah, my cute little bratty genin, a bond itself is normal for every thinking person with chakra. Married couples have it, siblings have it, friends and even enemies have it. You have one with the Hokage, the man at the ramen stand, even with me and your team mates."

Naruto blinked. "So... it just happens when people are close?"

Kakashi nodded. "It's like-- you learned about electricity in school, right?"

Naruto's mouth pursed thoughtfully. "It's a circuit-- when we get close to people, we make it? Like, the friendship or whatever is an easy path for chakra to flow."

Kakashi patted her head. "Right. So what happened with you and Haku?"

The bottom lip jutted out, and the forehead narrowed. Neither her father or mother had ever made that expression-- it was pure Naruto. Then, her face went flat for a second before breaking into a very small, very Kushina-sama like aha of a smile.

"We used so much chakra at once that the bond's been strong from the first moment."

"Exactly. What makes it stand out is how strong it is. I'd wager your bond with Iruka is almost as strong, but since it strengthened slowly and naturally, you never noticed it building up. A summons contract does a similar fast connection."

"So, so, Kashi-sensei," Naruto said, now eager and hopeful. "It's just, um, the _connection_ , right? It's not-- making us do anything, right?"

 _Ah. There's the real question_ , Kakashi thought, a bit chagrined. "Naruto, whatever you feel for Haku is from you. The bond, and its intensity, only makes the feelings easier to communicate. If you two had ended up enemies... well, you'd be each others bane of existence quite easily. I was like that with a Rock nin once. It was hell." This time, he ruffled her hair.

Naruto smiled, and suddenly hugged him. "Thanks, Kashi-sensei!"

Kakashi took a moment, but he hugged her back. "You're lucky to have him. Just... don't tell your god father what you want to _do_ to the boy yet."

The lip jutted out. "Well, yeah. I want him around for grand god kids, Kashi-sensei."

"Haku, or Jiraiya-sama?"

"Both!"

Then she was off, running up the nearest tree and dancing around the camp on the tree tops.

"Kashi-sensei. So now I'm a toasted ancient grain," the former ANBU muttered. But he was smiling under his mask as he raised a not at all orange or red book to his face.

* * *

"Who dressed you down this time?"

Part of Sasuke really wanted to grunt off Sakura, but every time it spoke up he saw a pair of eyes with red lines tattooed (or was it a birth mark?) below and a knowing smirk under that.... and it shut up.

"Jiraiya and Haku," he said. Then he found a smirk on his face. "You never did tell us your secret... Back at the bridge builder's house."

Sakura bit her lip. "Well... did you know, my mother is on both the Civilian and the Clan councils?"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "For that-- you're not part of a Shinobi clan, so you either are a very old family with something distinguishing in the past... or have a kekkei genkai..."

"Not everyone is so flashy with their blood. It's really kind of silly. Only Haruno women have it. It changes the colour of our hair-- my mom's was as pink as mine at one point, but now it's that red hue. And one of my aunt's is black... I'm hoping it will turn pink again someday."

"Interesting-- no, really," Sasuke said firmly to the dark look that earned him. "Like the blossoms you're named after. What triggers the change?"

"Certain emotional states," Sakura said, smirking, daring him to leave it or press it.

"And it's embarrassing-- is your aunt single?"

"Divorced."

Sasuke nodded slowly. "Does the love need to be mutual?"

"Yes, but... it usually starts when the attraction's one-sided. A hint of red at the roots. Blackening at rejection or betrayal, and turning pink or white again when you've let yourself recover."

Sasuke studied her hair. "It does look a bit lighter."

She shrugged. "Crushes run their course. I guess I was never invested enough to rate the black. Sorry."

Even as his mask said, "Not at all," there was a bitter stab of pain behind it, hidden by his Uchiha bearing. And then his mouth just kept going-- "They told me part of Kakashi's job is to kill me before I become another Itachi, and only the fact the Dead-Last cares about me is giving me any leeway at all."

Except that was wrong, he realized a spit second after he spoke. As wrong as saying his body had just moved to defend Naruto in his-- their fight with Haku. The truth was, he was at war with his Uchiha mask, and when he just did those things it meant the mask had lost for a moment.

Did he want to lose it? Was that better? Would that make him not Itachi-- no, Kakashi-sensei had said he needed to know what he'd be instead--

"-- listening to me?" Sakura said, crossly, and he rubbed his head. Naruto was right, she did hit hard.

He smirked. "No. I wandered into my own head," he admitted. Then he let the mask slip, on purpose this time as a try-out. "I'm sorry. I've had a lot to think about lately. You were saying?"

She smirked. "I was wondering, do you care about us?"

He sighed. "I don't know whether I know my own head well enough right now to answer that. What I do know is, I was not raised as well as my pride wants to say, people worry for me and about me, I do not wish to become my brother... and I'm not sure what I want to be. I mean, I feel my feet taking me down the road of the ninja, but is that what I want? Or just habit and breeding?"

"I... can't really see you as a baker," Sakura said flatly. He actually liked the bit of her that did that.

"Neither do I. But... who should I be? I know you can't answer that, or that it's likely going to be a trite thing like 'Sasuke'--"

Sakura _growled_. "You think that little of me? That's a useless answer if you're already thinking about it."

Sasuke blinked, and let the unmasked voice speak for him again. Odd, it was still his usual tone and diction, but it still felt different. "I don't know what to think about you, Sakura."

"What do you mean?"

"Exactly that. I don't know what to think about anyone. I haven't known what to think about anyone since Itachi killed my clan off and left me, and the past few weeks have made that worse, not better. To top it off, the way I was raised-- empathy wasn't really a factor."

Sakura got that look that said every cell in her brain was focused on the issue before her. "What was it like for you-- growing up before the massacre, I mean?"

Sasuke thought for a moment before answering, rejecting several 'stock' answers so he could tell her some truth. "When I was young, my father was a big, mean man I was never good enough for until my brother let him down. My mother was a saint that tried to be a normal perfect housewife even though I knew from an early age from how she moved she was as much a ninja as Father and Itachi. My brother was the one that trained me, cared about me, even when Mother was too busy running a clan household. He was my world, in a lot of ways."

"I.. heard some of the shinobi parents talk about him," Sakura said. "It was a shock, from what they said."

Sasuke sighed, lightly. "Before the massacre, I would have said he was the least blood thirsty ninja in the Elemental Nations. It wasn't-- there's mu, and he could do that, you know? But when he relaxed, it wasn't his default. He gave off... Care, I guess. He seemed so--"

"But he wasn't what he seemed," Sakura prompted.

"That's the thing. I'm not sure of that, Sakura. Especially now. I mean, what if Haku's right? What if he summoned the mu to get through the night because he thought he had to? And if he _is_ a monster, I..."

"He did it, not you," Sakura said.

"Yes. And if he did that, and for why he told me-- if I want to beat Itachi, I have to be the perfect prodigy he was. But-- the villagers are wrong. I'm no prodigy. I don't have the raw talent and power. I'm... just..."

Sakura was silent a moment, and he wondered if he had said too much, if this was more than what their fragile relationship could take.

"I think..." she began, and took a deep breath. "I think you're starting with a flawed premise and a flawed goal."

The mask sneered with rage. Sasuke simply frowned. "What makes you say that?"

"You are Sasuke."

This time he did sneer. "I thought that was trite...?"

She smirked back. "Only if that's where we leave it, Uchiha-baka. Look. You'll likely never have my chakra control or Narukun's reserves. In fact, from what Jiraiya's said, either of us could equal where Naruto is now with her reserves in a few years-- but we'll still lag, because she'll grow at the same rate-- and it's geometric in most ninjas who work at it, you understand?"

Sasuke thought a moment, then nodded. "It increases by a factor of three, on average. She'll always be an ocean, and we'll always be ponds. "

"And because she inherited her mother's vitality, she won't have to work for that. Same with my control. I'm starting with the smallest amount, but that chakra/ control ratio thing cuts both ways."

Sasuke found a small smile forming. "You'll always have an eyedropper to hone your chakra to the smallest amount, and we'll need to settle for a tap set as low as we can."

"Or a fire hose," Sakura smirked.

"She does tend to gush energy," Sasuke noted dryly.

"My point is... when it comes to growth-- look, my first Academy report was horrible."

Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "You often beat me in academic tests."

"Ah, but that first test... Ino-pig lorded the one mark that she did better on over me-- and we did piss poor, the both of us. They tell you all expectations at Academy are higher than in the civilian school, but..." Sakura tilted her head to one side and Sasuke nodded for her to go on. "So... Ino bragging. At first I thought I had to beat her. But for once, with that one thing, I was able to see-- the only one I had to beat was me. I was the only valid comparison to me. If my History mark was a little higher, my mission planning a little better, I was better than the last time I checked-- that was my goal."

"Well, it did seem to help your academics."

"My biggest problem was stopping at what came easy-- I have potential with ninjutsu. I could have started training with ijutsu sooner, if I had bothered to really assess myself. I could even manage to be passable in genjutsu, even though your natural talent likely outshines mine. But I got distracted competing with Ino over you, and it was habit and doing what was easy that got me the grades I did. Instead of looking at me, I have quite frankly been trying to be what my image of you would want. And that was just an image." She snorted. "It was a waste. I don't know you well enough to even declare interest. But now that I know this, I compare myself to when we set out for Nami no Kuni, and me now that we are leaving Nami... and I'm starting to get better again. And, you know, my sensei's proud of me. And I have a true friend now, with Narukun. And I can worry about you for what I know of you rather than dote on an image."

Sasuke frowned, and let the words in past the mask. "I am my only true measure."

Sakura nodded. "And if your measure of yourself depends on something to do with someone outside you, you're giving them power. The reason me and Ino-pig aren't really friends anymore is because we both made it about power. And when you and Narukun begin comparing who's got more of the will of steel in them--"

"We end up brawling instead of sparring."

Sakura's smile was bittersweet. "And people question if helping is worth it if you give up control so easy."

\---

Haku blinked. "What brought this question on, Kakashi-san?"

"My blond cute little bratty genin was asking me about your... connection," Kakashi-san said, his smile only barely reaching his eye.

"Ah," Haku said. He paused, gathering his thoughts as best he could. "Is Naruto--"

"About three miles that way with Jiraiya. And my ninken Urushi and Uhei are patrolling to chase off any of Jiraiya's little friends."

Kakashi-san's single eye was locked on him in a way that made it clear he could not dodge the issue. So... best be honest.

"If I promise there is a point to it, will you listen a moment?"

Kakashi-san's eye narrowed, but he nodded.

"My relationship with Zabuza-sama was not the healthiest thing. Oh, he cared for me like a father or brother might, and I cared for him. The problem was how I saw my own value for him. I was his tool. I don't know if he saw how deep that went, but... I was ready to die for him. Finding _he_ had died for _me_ was a bit of a shake up. And then there was Naruto..."

"Yes...?"

Haku sighed. "Part of me was eager to pledge myself as her tool... but I knew from what I saw in the mirrors that she would not accept that. So I resolved to wait and see how she treated me, and how I was feeling for her..."

Kakashi-san might have smirked, Haku wasn't that good at reading the single eye he left exposed. "And?"

Haku sighed. "I-- the only model I have of a happy couple are a pair of cross-dressing prostitutes. But... Mako-kun and Takera-chan... they were friends, and lovers, and partners, and their own people. I look at Naruto-- and I see that possibility for us."

Kakashi-san grunted. "You do realize the Kyuubi no Youko is a fire demon, yes? Its chakra merged with Naruto's may prove anathema to your Hyouton. The Yuki clan would die out."

Haku blinked. "I have never used my mother's--"

"Ma. I did a little research with the help of my pack. Some ninjas in Yukigakure can manipulate ice and snow, but that is using existing samples around them-- likely via Suiton. A few wind wielders use their release to freeze water, but again-- using Fuuton that way requires existing water. And you've declared it a kekkei genkai, which only one clan claimed. And that may die when your water meets Uzumaki fire."

Haku smirked. "Or perhaps it will merely adapt. It has been said of the Uzumaki that the men and women apply their clan's vitality in wildly different ways. That the very chakra strength they are known for prevented a stable kekkei genkai from manifesting. In that case, trying to maintain my release in future generations may be fool's play. It maybe that as we rebuild, our sons and daughters will combine the element we share with fire and water as they will. Our children will take the Uzumaki name, either way"

"You already picture children?"

Haku couldn't stop the dreamy look in his eyes. "Hatake-san. Tell me... how old would-- I mean, I know some will always look askance at our children, but how old should we be before we consider it?"

Now he knew Kakashi-san was smirking.

\---

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Jiraiya-jiji said, smirk falling from his face and worry in his eyes.

"Going to have to deal with it either way, Ero-jiji. I just have to manage to meditate some how. Always found it hard. But, I'll do what must be done, believe it!" she said bluntly. "Might as well start now."

"Okay," Jiraiya said. "Now, your mother had a hard time meditating too. So we worked out a special jutsu Minato and I performed to help her the first few times."

"Really? That's awesome! Hit me, Jirai-ji!"

"That's the idea," Jiraiya agreed.

"Huh?"

" **Namikaze Hinjutsu: Hammer of Dreaming Mind**!"

"Wait--"

Then she felt a sharp impact, like a strike from a mildly annoyed Sakura-- and thus only having a slight chance of concussing-- and she was in.

Jiraiya-jiji called it her dreaming mind, but she hardly recalled dreaming of a sewer. She covered the territory slowly, walking down the stairs that appeared. So maybe it was the fox, feeling both contained and in need of homage-- these were grand sewers, to be sure, and that cage was for something important--

Speak of the bijuu. She stepped forward, toward the cage.

"I was wondering when you'd grace me with your attentions," the Kyuubi growled.

"Sorry I didn't show up sooner," Naruto said gently. "I wasn't even told you were here until recently--"

"Of course not, and I sat here, knowing how--"

Naruto gave a little exasperated breath to her "tenant". "As if you're all that knowing on my past, Kyuubi-san. Jiraiya-jiji told me the seal is a wall between our minds, and you only got so far last time. I bet you were so aching for mayhem, you only caught glimpses, and the mirrors drove you back. Must have felt overwhelming."

"I am beyond your comprehension--"

"Hold on," Naruto said, and focused-- not hard, but like she was changing something in a day dream.

The sewer and the bars faded, leaving them in a plain white space.

"There. You were saying?"

The Kyuubi lurched forward, growing in size, strangely hand-like front paws pulling it ahead, maw opening wide--

There was a puzzled 'whuff?' as its jaws reacted to Naruto like they might a rock or stick stuck in a fox's jaw. The Kyuubi tried to close its jaw several times, the "muscles" straining, before it opened it slightly and Naruto stepped out.

"What Uzumaki trick is this? I at least managed to nip the old keeper!"

"Actually, that's part of what I came here to explain," Naruto said pleasantly. "Look, this featureless plane really doesn't suit either of us; how fox-like are you, really?"

The fox growled lightly, then looked around. "What did you have in mind?"

The place looked like a mix between a fox's den and Iruka-sensei's, warm and welcoming and born of Earth. "There. Is this comfortable? Anything you'd like to change?"

The Kyuubi considered her, as if unsure how to handle politeness. "As you have knowledge I wish, and I can't beat it out of you, I'll abide with this for now..."

Naruto simply smiled at its posturing, the way she might at an ANBU who tried to intimidate her out of a well deserved chase scene after a prank. "Thank you."

* * *

Jiraiya caught the chain without looking up.

"Oni Kyoudai, right?" he asked with a yawn. "Twin brothers from Kiragakure? Missing chuunin? Known for combo attacks? Kakashi said something about leaving you for the law before he found out there was none."

"We just want the kid, ojisan," one of the twins before him growled.

"I noticed. I'm her god father."

"We'll go through you," the other twin said with a grin.

Jiraiya looked at them. "You'd have to. I am the Toad Sage, Jiraiya." His smirk became a nasty grin as he used the chain to keep the two from running. "Thank you. I was getting bored."

* * *

" _ **Me? Bond to a mortal lifespan? You idiot, I'm supposed to be eternal, the greatest of the bijuu!**_ "

"You're taking this better than I thought," Naruto said cheerfully.

" _ **Your meddlesome father had no right to--**_ "

"Now, now. If one of the other bijuu had come after you, you would have done the same, believe it! Not that I'd think you'd make it easy, but..."

The fox blinked.

"Is that a yes?"

"... you're not like the chain-bearer or the first sealer, are you whelp?"

Naruto shrugged. "Our relationship is going to have to be a bit different if either of us wants a life. I die, you die."

* * *

" _Oh god please I wanted kids someday!_ "

" **Then prove you'd contribute to the gene pool! And** _ **you**_!"

" _Ah! No! It was his idea! I wanted to talk, I'm sorry!_ "

"I can tell."

"Really, Jiraiya-sama?"

"Yes... **which is why you're only getting two millenniums!** _ **ONE THOUSAND YEARS OF--**_ "

* * *

"These say they belong to Haku," Jiraiya said, as his god daughter came to alertness. She blinked at him, at her sensei nearby, and at slack jawed team mates and betrothed before turning to the duo Jiraiya was referring to.

Obviously the two Mist chuunin, one bound to a tree by their shared chain and one being sat on by a giant toad were familiar, as she pointed and said, "Hey, you two tried to kill us!"

"Oh," Jiraiya said, turning to the two. "Did they?"

The one on the ground screamed and wet himself again, and the one on the tree moaned and started muttering, "Two thousand years is enough, I'll be good, I've learned Gamma-sennin, no more pain..."

"You showed remarkable restraint, Jiraiya-sama," Kakashi noted idly, returning to his book. He looked back up as the four younger members of their party turned to him. "Ma. You should see him when he's _angry_."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sakura's cosmetic limit is burrowed from the wonderful Random1377 fic, [Full Bloom](http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3349205/1/Full_Bloom). I have modified the mechanics slightly to suit this story.
> 
> Now. On the Kyuubi. What will its relationship to Naruto be like in this fic?
> 
> I'll give you one hint, and it also holds how I'd explain Killer Bee and the Eight Tails.
> 
> Promethea Issue #18.
> 
> BE GONE!


	4. A Week As The Leaves Fly, Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heading home.

**DAY 1: MISSIVES and CAMPFIRE CHATS**

"Okay, she's nice and all, and I'm gonna write it," Narukun assured her team mate, "but, what made you think of Hinata?"

"What makes you think--"

"Sakura," Sasuke interrupted, "now that we see you applying your mind to things, its hard **not** to wonder about motive when you recommend something."

"And when need be, you can be rather... forceful," Haku said coolly from Narukun's side. She had to smile at how easily Narukun leaned into Haku, his arm automatically wrapping around her, even as her heart felt a pang at her now nearly white hair.

"Yeah," Narukun muttered. "Almost as bad as when Jiji is bribing me with ramen..."

Sakura snorted-- and the fact that she felt comfortable enough to snort around her team mates actually gave her a warm glow. "There a better way to bribe you?"

"Of course," Narukun said, and paused as Sasuke raised a water skin. "Porn. Believe it!"

The spit take from their Uchiha team mate was too perfect not to have been the planned result of the comment. "If your godfather wasn't so absolutely committed to not seeing what an Pervert teme she is..." he grumbled, but there was that hope stirring smirk again. “Naruto, she's been crushing on you for at least two years."

"Longer," Sakura said, and she had to smile at the absolutely stunned look on Narukun's face. "And... Hinata's got issues."

"Whole clan's got issues, the ninken specialists are probably the only ones that don't, and that's excluding their father running off scared of their mother," Sasuke noted. "You seem to inspire her, which is a good thing to have when you're a Kage wannabe. But she's shy, and her confidence is... pretty piss poor. You make sure she knows you weren't lying to her, though, you'll have a friend and Team Kurenai will be easier to deal with as a whole. It also will reassure her father-- that his friend's daughter is his daughter's friend."

"I was just worried about Hinata," Sakura said, frowning.

"I know. But we have to think of both the big and little picture, as a certain someone reminded me with a blade at my throat," Sasuke said, giving Sakura a dry look that practically dared denial. She simply smiled, nodding to concede the point.

Haku was nodding, slowly. "There were people back home in Kirigakure no Sato who I trusted..."

"You acted like they deserved the respect and it was returned?" Sasuke said, and Haku's smirk and nod confirmed to Sakura the Uchiha was echoing the ice nin's words back to him.

Sakura inclined her head to her left. "But don't use the formal letter Kakashi-sensei had you draft. Make it personal."

Narukun's bottom lip jutted out. "Then... I should write all of the grads from our year. I've already told Gai-sensei's team... and, Kiba, Choji and Shikamaru are already my friends. I don't want anyone to be left out and think I don't trust them." Then she gave a foxy grin.

"So help me, if you bring up offering Hinata a threesome..." Sakura said, raising a fist.

"No no no!" said Narukun, cringing closer to Haku.

"Good," Sakura said, raising her own water skin.

"Team mates get first chance," the blond added offhandedly.

After her coughing died down, Sakura grabbed a stick and tossed it at Narukun, who ducked it and laughed even as her team mate loudly declared her " _Pervert_!"

"Use Pakkun. Most of their parents know him."

The three genin startled at their sensei's interruption. Sasuke's eyes went wide, and froze there as it seemed he couldn't-- or didn't want to-- let his face settle into the angry arrogance it usually did. Narukun gave a "gah", fell back off the log she was on before Haku-san could catch her, clambered up to lean her arms and head against the log, and shot Kakashi-sensei a glare. Even Haku had blinked suddenly at the appearance, though his control was good. Sakura slowly lowered her own arm from her chest and shot her own glare at their far too laid back jounin.

"Oh, sorry. I knew I could probably help, and meant to be here from the start, but I bumped into a young man with a tail accompanying a priest heading west, and they needed help with a warrior king who was afraid of women, but you two are too young to trigger--"

"Idiot!" Sakura said, unable to stop herself.

"Liar!" Narukun said, leaping to stand on the log and point at him as if delivering a summation before the Daimyo Court.

"Sensei," Sasuke said, shaking his head with a grumbling sigh.

"Are all his excuses like this?" Haku murmured.

"No," Kakashi assured him, "Sometimes I get creative. Ah, well, be that as it may," and that exposed eye of his narrowed in focus instead of amusement. "I myself have been sending some messages to Konoha, and Pakkun has returned with the replies. I wanted to see the response so we can plan how to handle things, and we're about a week out from home. Yes, that's why we haven't been moving as fast as we could. And since Jiraiya-sama is busy... debriefing Haku-san's friends..." He fished out a scroll, handing it to Narukun. "Here, read this first, let Sakura and Sasuke have a look," Kakashi said, as Narukun sat down again. "Hyuuga-sama sent me a copy."

Sakura frowned thoughtfully as Narukun's eyes steadily went wider, and Haku's narrowed as he read over her shoulder. When the blond was finished, she handed the scroll to Sakura. Sakura found herself blinking and at Sasuke's light touch on her hand, inclined it so he could scan it as well. Several interested "Hn" grunts followed.

"That's why you had me write that out..." Narukun said. "So-- I'd be the one telling them!"

"Break the law only to change it," Kakashi said mildly.

"Your yakuza friend merely agreed to the stipulations the others added. I am not accusing him of anything--"

"He didn't just sign for him, Uchiha-san," Haku-san noted.

Sasuke looked at the page, nodding slowly. "I see. 'For the Kogami Group'. Mm. So him sending one of his accountants--"

"Shin-kun's a lawyer, too-- he handles a lot of... business stuff," Narukun said.

Sasuke smirked. "So he'll loan his best as needed."

Sakura was intently looking at the words on the page. "Kakashi-sensei... has Morino-sama always been annoyed at not being able to prosecute people in regards to Narukun?"

Kakashi was giving the teaching mode eyebrow again. "Explain."

Sakura found herself speaking in earnest. "Is his calligraphy always this messy? It seems to be the strokes of a man in a rush who could do better-- not that it's a perfect indicator..."

A slight proud look flashed through Sensei's exposed eye before he went on. "True. And no, Ibiki-san's calligraphy is always impeccable. The Hokage... made allowances in his instructions to the ANBU about grievances regarding Naruto in regards to the pain the Nine-Tails caused. Sarutobi-sama has admitted that the leeway has been exhausted-- even before Mizuki's betrayal clinched it. For a man who has dedicated his life to understanding pain-- Ibiki almost certainly finds how some treat Naruto repugnant, and has taken to redressing it with zeal. However, given the opportunity to make it official, and knowledge that some may be bordering on treason with false reports..."

Sasuke studied the writing as well. "Hn. And Hyuuga-sama's calligraphy-- whenever he shows me documents for the Clan Council, his writing is precise but not so... stiff."

"If he was a friend of Naruko's parents, he's likely angry he has not been teaching his Hokage's daughter how to deal with it from day one," Haku-san said-- and Sakura noted the new pet name as one she should never, ever, use herself.

Narukun smirked suddenly. " **Oi**! Sakura-nee-chan! It is good that Gai-sensei wishes to pool the jounin sensei's most youthful skills to fan their genin's most heated blood higher, ne?"

Sakura grinned. " **Yosh**! My fellow kohai! Surely the Twin Green Beasts of Konoha will unlock the youthful talent within each of us, allowing us to become geniuses of hard work!"

"Indeed! I hope that my will of fire is not extinguished in the face of the Mighty Guy's infamous training regime!"

"If it does, you will make it up by climbing Hokage Mountain with only your thumbs!"

She noticed Sasuke and Haku slowly roll their eyes to look at each other in a silent plea for sanity.

" **SAKURA-CHAN**!"

" **NARU-KUN!** "

" _ **SAKURA-CHAN!**_ "

" _ **NARU--**_ "

Kakashi-sensei placed a single finger on each pair of lips. "Yes, it very nice he wants us to cross train-- but we are the _cool and hip_ team, okay my cute little genin?"

Narukun's shoulders slumped and she hooded her eyes in a disinterested manner. "Whatever."

"Meh," Sakura noted lightly.

"Hn," Sasuke said.

"Mm," Haku-san agreed

They all looked at Kakashi-sensei.

"Did you four say something?" he asked coolly, already buried in a book.

There was a moment of stunned silence befitting the "coolness intent" he was giving off.

"We'll never be our sensei's equals!" Sakura mock-moaned.

"None of that," Sasuke said sternly, patting her shoulder. "We know he's a idiot under it all."

Sakura had to remind herself she was over her crush. She waved the scroll. "Narukun! Haku-san! Apparently, my mother thinks you both need to be domesticated."

"I'm not that wild!" Narukun objected.

"Hokage monument," Kakashi-sensei offered.

"Dye in the Usagi Ladies' Bathhouse," Sakura added.

"Chili pepper on the toilet paper in the chuunin-sensei bathroom in the academy," Sasuke recalled.

"That live fish in my bed roll before we left Wave," Haku-san smirked.

"... white lotus tiles?" Narukun offered weakly.

* * *

"Do you want to be her friend?"

Hinata bit her lip and knew she was blushing. In a way, it was nice that her father was spending so much time with her today, even if he was just making sure that she did not stain the family's honour with her response to the letter.

"Yes," she finally said. "She-- wants to be my friend and... I'd like that."

Her father gave her a small smile-- and what a rare and wondrous thing! a smile not for diplomacy or show! "That's good. You know, I think Uzumaki-kun neglected to mention this because she wanted you to focus on the fact she wants _you_ to be _her_ friend, but her father was a great friend of mine. Your cousin Yachi lives in her building, and she has been keeping an eye on him-- her, rather, for me."

Hinata frowned. "Otousan-- why not help... Naru-chan," that suited, yes, "more if she is a friend of our family? I-I know there must be a good reason, because you take such things so seriously--"

"Peace, child," her father said-- a phrase rarely used in the years since her mother's death, and another glittering gem in a wonderful day. "Yes, your reasoning is correct. It is because I take it so seriously that I have accepted that I could not-- that I forced myself not to. And once again, I think Naruto-kun didn't tell you the reason because she wishes you to see her as she really is."

Hinata found that phrase sticking in her head, 'see her as she really is'. "Then... perhaps you should not tell me now. I can... I shall wait until Naru-chan is ready to tell me herself."

Hiashi gave his eldest another small smile. "That is a wise course." Then, he grew serious again. "Now, you have training with your team tomorrow. Please, do not let this matter distract you. Yuhi-sensei's reports are quite encouraging, and I would hope they continue to be so."

His stern look earned a bow and a, "Hai, Otousan." Then, biting her lip again, Hinata did something she had not allowed herself in a while.

The hug was brief, but for the instant that her father's arm had been around her, Hinata was glad for her bravery.

* * *

"Of course," Kakashi said, lowering his book as Haku passed him a plate, "every good clan head should know how to do at least the basics of any job to maintain a house." He paused, figured to hell with it, and pulled his mask down to eat without raising his book as a shield.

None of his genin saw fit to comment, though he did catch Sakura's smirk and Naruto's quick once over.

"Really?" Sakura said.

"Yes. And if a clan head is through no fault of their own without what they need to do those tasks... in Konoha, anyway, you have but to ask. That's also why Hyuuga-sama insisted Konoha lend nins to protect Shippuden."

"Because if I had a clan, I'd send people myself," Naruto murmured as she tucked in to the rabbit stew, and Kakashi was pleased to note it wasn't a question.

"And ryo to rice cakes," Kakashi continued, "several of his personal guard are having a word with some merchants right now-- as a gesture of care before the ANBU show up. Oh, Anko-san's gonna have fun with this."

"Oh?" Sakura asked.

"She likes playing the sadistic bitch on occasion."

"Do the merchants in Konoha really play such games?" Haku asked.

Kakashi sighed. "It's like any other market. There's the cold math of the economy, and the cold reality of human emotion. There are several shinobi stores that would think nothing of charging Sakura upwards of four times what they'd charge a 'real' shinobi. They know better than to give an outrageous discount to a clans member, though."

"It'd be considered an offensive act," Sasuke said to Sakura and Naruto's questioning looks. "Why would someone paid for the village's defence and honour need a discount? Is the shinobi not earning their keep?"

"Either give the gift outright or charge them properly," Haku said. "Ninjas should not need bribes to care for the village."

"Only the agreed pay for their services," Sakura said, nodding. "But, if that's the cause, surely years of selling to..." She trailed off as Kakashi shook his head. "What am I missing?"

"Humans don't always use their minds that rationally-- a fact you have first hand experience with." He smiled at the stuck out tongue. "Exactly. Point being, many a civilian store refuses to see how such practices offend shinobi, even if you try to explain, and the shinobi that play favourites in their stores don't seem to realize they only hurt Konoha by outfitting its defenders poorly just because they weren’t 'born nin'. Add to that a few shinobi being all too willing to take the discount, and both end up with honest jounin and most chuunin ignoring their shops... so they prey on the genin," Kakashi said, knowing his frustration was in his voice and in the slight frown he now showed them. "Even then, some still think they're currying favour, and that the nins are fools for not realizing things... Maa."

"What happened to the Namikaze/Uzumaki lands and homes?" Sasuke said. "Iruka-sensei is requesting new lands, did not the Hokage and Hyuuga-sama safe guard them?"

Kakashi considered the Uchiha carefully. "Your father... Sensei had land, yes. But the land he set aside for a homestead... Fugaku managed to get them annexed to expand the Uchiha clan compound."

In one fluid movement, the boy was up, and had tossed three kunai at a nearby tree. He sat again. "I will talk with Sarutobi-sama. This will not stand." He held up a hand to forestall Naruto's protests. "Naruto, I am not going to get in the habit of calling another's loss acceptable just because I gained. That's too close to my father's way, and for all I know, that's one of the reasons my brother... killed my clan. I gave my word to you, so--"

The sight of the dojutso bearer being glomped by the jinchuuriki brought a smile to Kakashi's face, especially the Uchiha's awkward back pat/hug back. The action made things turn over in his head. He had to be the sensei his sensei would want to all his students.

"That's next, then," he said.

"What's next, Sensei?" Sakura asked.

"We've gotten the ball rolling on Naruto. While she is writing her letters, Sasuke will write to the Hokage requesting all available information on what happened to his clan."

"And even what they don't tell us, will tell us a lot," Haku murmured.

"Why wouldn't-- wait, same reason he wouldn't tell me, right? Thinking we're not ready," Naruto muttered.

"It's a natural impulse to want to protect the next generation," Kakashi said with a sigh. "Look at Itachi, treated as an adult so fast. I was his captain in the ANBU, and I've wondered-- was the pressure a trigger?"

"You were my brother's senpai...?" Sasuke's eyes narrowed.

"I don't doubt it was a factor-- one of many-- in being chosen as your jounin sensei. There was a reason I was made his captain, too-- we both gained rank quickly."

"You were a prodigy too, then?" Sakura asked as one eyebrow rose. It was somewhere between impressed and a challenge.

"I passed the academy exam at age five. That fit your definition?" He smirked as both her eyebrows elevated. "That was okay, I guess. I think what caused the most hardship was when I was made chuunin at age six."

"... that is not healthy," Haku murmured, finally, breaking the silence.

"I'm inclined to agree. It's one reason why I dodged a jounin promotion until I was almost 13. In some ways, I was asked to grow up too soon. At the same time..."

Kakashi paused, thinking his words over, and tried not to notice the absolute attention of the other four nins.

"As nins, even genin, we have to treat you as adults, expect you to act as nins, give you many rights no civilian has for the simple reason that the path of a Ninja is one that demands you live in it. You can't grow up to be a ninja, you have to grow up as one. It's... hard to guide growing nins correctly, especially to the point of letting go. Being a ninja can be cruel and harsh, even as we do and see amazing things. We can't shelter you completely, but too much too fast..." He sighed. "Training you cute little genin to kill should never be fun. And for me, it isn't. But I'll do my best for you."

He didn't even have time to raise his book before his sensei's daughter had tackled him with a hug. "Thank you, Sensei!"

Hatake Kakashi wondered if his return hug looked as awkward as it felt. He felt a hand on his shoulder and saw Sakura beside him.

"Thanks, Kakashi-sensei."

He looked up to see Sasuke meeting his eyes, the small smile that stirred hope in his gut and reminded him of his team mate on the young mans face. Sasuke bowed his head just enough to carry the point. Haku smiled that that calm smile of his and nodded.

Hatake Kakashi was not blushing. No matter what anyone said later.

* * *

 **DAY 2: DELIBERATIONS AND DOUBLES**

"Just... tell me I haven't doomed Minato's child," Hiruzen said, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"None of us have," Utatane Koharu assured him. Her gaze was firm and stern, though that might have just been the squint brought on by the vision jutsus she specialized in. "We did our best. We simply have the information we need to change that approach, now."

"Luckily," Mitokado Homura said, a small smile gracing his lips as he adjusted his glasses. "It may just be soon enough to repair our... more permissive leanings."

"Homura," Koharu chided. "We all know you feel the law is the law, but we would have had even more civil disobedience had we not factored the pain of the populace in at all."

"I'm sorry. I truly did not mean it as a dig," Homura said, growing serious. "I am... simply glad now that Ibiki can use the rope they given us to hang those that abuse that respect for pain."

"He's kept records," Hiruzen noted.

"Oh?" Koharu said, smirking.

"Tani Ryu has spat at Naruto 87 times," Hiruzen said. "Ibiki has great plans for when the ANBU bring him in after the 88th time he does it. And this matter of the merchants-- shinobi and civilian-- that we let slide too much."

Homura gave a nod and slight smile, accepting the implied apology. "I take it, it is in good hands?"

Hiruzen turned to the fourth member of their little gathering. "I'd say so."

Two dark eyes twinkling with sardonic humour peered from under a saggy mop of dark hair. The man raised his right arm, and he rolled up the sleeve, exposing a row of seals on the inside forearm. He brushed one, and a scroll dropped out of the storage space the seal created. "Here is Shin's preliminary report. Hino Hokuto and Mitarashi Anko practically demanded to help."

The Hokage took the scroll with a raised eyebrow. "Oh...?"

Shimura Danzou smirked. "Yes, Anko-san has promised to rein in the blood play until Shin says so. Shin has told me that will be soon. They all had that look in their eyes..."

Homura's eyebrows rose above the frame of his glasses, "He is chomping at the bit to deal with this."

"Of course," Danzou said. "You know how he feels about those that would harm Naruto on simple principle. As for Anko-san..."

"It grates her, seeing Minato-kun and Kushina-kun's child treated that way. They never cared who her sensei was, and she has always felt that the bo-- young lady was as human as she," Koharu said. "She will likely empathize even more, given recent revelations."

Hiruzen sighed.

"Sarutobi-Hokage-sama," Danzou said, half sighing the name out.

"When are you going to stop calling me that?" Hiruzen hissed.

"When it stops being an easy way to get your attention," Danzou snapped back. "Hiruzen, Minato-sama may have been an idealist, but one does not master the arts he did without a pragmatic streak a mile wide. He wanted his daughter safe; he took steps to keep her safe. For whatever reason, he chose to only tell his sensei. So be it. The question at the moment should not be 'why did he do this', but rather 'how do we deal with this.'"

"I still feel we should counsel against letting this betrothal go ahead without our--" Koharu began, but stopped as both Danzou and Hiruzen glared at her. She noticed Homura smirking. "I see the matter is decided," she sighed.

"Much as it pains me to say it, Naruto-kun may be on the firmest ground we've given her-- and we didn't even give her that. We're just forced to acknowledge it," Homura said. "Which raises a new issue. If she is less preoccupied with her lot in life, she will start paying attention to outside problems. It's an admirable trait, her eagerness to help... but one of her nearest possible focuses is worrying."

There was silence, and then Danzou sighed deeply. "The sad thing is, Sasuke deserves answers. And even after all these years... I feel it might be best to tell him the truth."

"He won't like that," Koharu advised.

Hiruzen smiled sadly. "Children rarely do like discovering their elders are as in the dark as they are."

* * *

"It's a good question," Akunoyosha Gouzu said, looking into the fire. "It... would be nice to have a place to call home again. Maybe make jounin."

The peace around the campfire was that of nins who had sorted out the picking order with diplomatic words and firm violence-- the air rather relaxed. Civilians would have been surprised, Haku knew. But then, as Hatake-san had pointed out earlier, shinobi grew in a way that placed life in a different light.

Meizu gave a small snort. "Yes, Niisan, provided I can keep my temper, you have a large enough library, and we don't go stir crazy in a week."

Gouzu smirked. "Five minutes difference, and you're Otouto and I'm a nii-san."

Naruto was looking at the Demon Brothers carefully.

"Problem?" Meizu enquired, and thankfully, Haku noticed his voice was wary instead of irritated. When the younger oni got irritated...

"Are you in the bingo books, I know Haku avoided it, and it'd make it easier to get in..."

Gouzu sighed. "Sorry, kid. Even without our masks, our MO is pretty well known. We'd have to totally change it to pass off as anyone other than the Oni Kyodai."

"Then your best bet is openness," Jiraiya said. "Being a defector doesn't really concern Hiruzen-sensei, once Ibiki-san is done vetting you."

"I would hope so, given his reputation," Meizu murmured.

"Maa, not so bad, surely?" Kakashi said, eye showing a smile. "Sometimes, it doesn't even hurt."

* * *

Yakushi Kabuto was getting... wary.

His delicate little balancing act between Orochimaru (the man who gave him choice, if a very weighted one), Madara (the man that offered power and a 'cause' that Yakushi knew in his gut was as hollow as any concern the Uchiha voiced for Konoha), and his true master (who was, of course, Yakushi Kabuto) was getting difficult.

The Snake's plan to take the "last" Uchiha's eyes and his own inklings to shape the Uzumaki orphan into something useful seemed to have some new obstruction, and it was worrying. Several people-- from that irritating ramen stand owner to the Hokage himself-- had seemed eager to get the boy back home.

From what little he could gleam, it wasn't due to any injury, nor was this in the spirit of restricting the vessel's movements. And there was... worrying noise from various clans. And Danzou's eldest boy was talking to merchants a lot; one or two of them had been taken to T&I. While it seemed all had been merely subjected to the Interrogation side of the ANBU's most infamous unit, with the fact this recent action seemed tied to Uzumaki... he was tempted to adopt the unofficial Nara clan motto.

Troublesome.

He'd wait. He was good at waiting. And he'd decide, as always, what he told his masters.

Control what they know, and you could make a king your slave...

* * *

 **DAY 3: EATING AND SHAPING**

Hatake noticed the way Sakura was... nibbling at the venison Haku had made and frowned. Even cold as a morning repast, it was excellent.

It wasn't the taste that kept Sakura from eating.

How to get the girl eating properly after years of habit otherwise? Part of her was probably screaming civilian nonsense about her figure, another about being an "elegant kunoichi" (as if any kunoichi accomplished that by starving herself)... and that all screamed "self esteem hot button to depression".

Kakashi held back a blink as a memory of an often repeated scene between Minato-sensei and himself came to him. From his new perspective of trying to teach himself to teach, it was suddenly obvious what was going on back then.

"Sakura?"

"Hai, sensei?"

"Give me five reasons you're going to eat that whole bowl of food."

She blinked at him. "I actually..."

"Give me five reasons," he repeated.

She looked at him as if he was nuts a moment, then back at the bowl in her lap. Deer meat, on top of greens, on top of rice. Her face flickered between thoughtful and panicked.

"You've got the makings of a lean, toned figure with protein to fuel the muscles."

Sasuke had not looked up from his bowl, and his delivery was off hand, but it took all Kakashi's will not to smirk.

Sakura looked at Sasuke, and then at the bowl. Thoughtful was winning. "Food is fuel for the body. This is... good fuel. The greens will give me the vitamins I need to avoid scurvy and other deficiencies." She bit her lips.

"Eating this means we can skip those damn ration bars," Meizu grumbled. Then he gestured with his bowl at Haku. "And it's shockingly good as always, Ototo-senpai."

"Arigato," Haku said, smirking at the term of reference.

"No kunoichi ever made it to chuunin on an empty stomach," Gouzu said, and his voice was a quiet, matter of fact tone, a placid pool to Meizu's raging river. "Mainly because it messes up your metabolism, which in turn screws with your chakra. You'd probably have a bit more to use and better control if you ate better."

"I've met your mother," Jiraiya noted, He raised one eyebrow. "Look at how she looks, and how she eats. And she's not even a kunoichi."

Sakura looked at the bowl, in full on thinking mode now. "I'm... probably lagging behind Naruto and Sasuke during travel partly because I don't have energy from under eating. And if I'm a shinobi, I should eat like it." She frowned. "But my stomach is--"

"It’s hunger," Naruto said, in that quiet way that made Kakashi's soul ache-- because you know she was speaking from experience she'd rather not have. "It's easier to trick yourself that it's nausea when you can't-- um, don't want to fix it. You need to start paying attention to your body so you know what you need. I'd like to live on just ramen, but I'd get sick if I didn't put some carrots and stuff in there." Then the squinted, eye-hiding grin. "That, and Jiji would kill me if I did. Believe it!"

Sakura looked at the bowl, and grabbed a bit of the pull-apart tender meat, some greens, and rice.

No one commented on how quickly she ate once she started.

* * *

Rock Lee was actually the one to break off and look at their sensei, worried.

"Cease!" Gai said, gesturing grandly. "Lee, please move on to your brick breaking. TenTen, the targets in the yard we set up earlier should see use honing your most youthful ranged attack. Go!"

At their "Hai, sensei," and scampering off, Gai turned to him. Neji turned, a sneer primed to go, ready to dodge this outsider he had to put up with as a jounin sensei.

Gai's eyes stopped him, open and sad and not at all what he usually showed the world.

"I leave you with your thoughts, Neji."

And he leaped away.

Neji's fist clenched, and he suddenly realized he had wanted to argue with Gai, or Rock Lee, or anyone. He needed to reaffirm the truth somehow.

Now he was alone with the questions that a simple introduction had left him with. And he knew if he tried to involve the others-- Neji winced. Gai's mastery of hand to hand had taught their sensei... ways to deal with the Hyuuga arts.

* * *

Years later, when asked why he became one of the Orange Hokage's closest advisers, he'd just smile.

On the night it happened, Naruto's godfather was giving them a history lesson. Jiraiya had that patient little smile on his face. "It's why so many of your mother's clan came to Konoha when Whirlpool fell-- hell, why we took more refugees than anyone else. To this day, you'll see the Uzumaki spiral on Konoha nin."

Naruto stood slowly. She turned away from the others and looked out into the forest. Kakashi-sensei had led the twins off-- 'to patrol' and to keep an eye on them. So it was Jiraiya-sama, her team mates, and her betrothed.

"Are... any of the Senju left?" Sasuke asked.

"As far as we know, only my old team mate, Tsunade."

"And we are, at this point, the last of our clans that matter..."

"The last descendants of the Rikudia-Sennin," Sakura murmured.

"Then it's up to us."

Naruto's voice had gravity, a focus Sasuke had often heard but never recognized for what it was. She turned, walked over to Sasuke, and bowed. "Uchiha-sama," she said as formal as she could. "I offer peace between our clans. Let's-- let's get along and not let the people that came before being idiots ruin our lives." She looked up at him, nervousness and hope in her eyes.

But there... underneath the underneath... Sasuke saw it.

It was how Sarutobi-sama's eyes looked at every citizen of the leaf. And it was how Naruto looked at all her precious people.

How she looked at Haku, Hatake-sensei, Iruka-sensei, Sakura... and himself.

On the night it happened, Uchiha Sasuke met the eyes of Uzumaki Naruto, and knew for the first time who he'd be, and not just who he was not.

"Stand up," he said, as he stood himself. Naruto did, lip jutting out, eyes narrowed warily. "You're going to keep the orange suit when you become Hokage?"

That foxy grin appeared on his team mate's face. "Jirai-jiji tells me you had to force my father into the robes. And Jiji hates the damn hat. You think I'm gonna give up this fine piece of tailoring?"

"Idiot," he said, and from his team mate's grin, he knew it was taken as the sign of friendship he meant it as. "Bowing so low to an equal is shameful. One day, my kids will be bugging you about getting an A-Class, like we did at their age--"

And kami if that didn't earn another hug. Actually, he believed the term was glomp.

* * *


	5. A Week As The Leaves Fly, Part  Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting the rest of the way home. Getting home the rest of the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Word Count for this chapter is OVER 9000!
> 
> (is mobbed)

**DREAMTIME**

“I half expected, if we did meet, you’d be pestering me to start teaching you jutsus,” the Kyuubi said, sitting in a conjured chair in a place that only existed where two minds barely touched.

The prison looked puzzled. “I don’t think you think of anything you do that way. Am I wrong?”

The being that humanity called “Nine Tailed Demon Fox” blinked at this question, and had so often happened as of late, found itself startled into honesty. “I... no. Not as such. But both your predecessors figured out ways to use my chakra...”

And now it was cursing itself again, because surely ever little detail was building up to a bid for control, wrestling its rightful power away from it.

Any second now.

“Well, when we get to know each other better, we can work on that.”

The Kyuubi held back a frustrated growl. The prison was not, by any means, an idiot. There were over a dozen times she could have asserted more control. Why wasn’t she? What was her game...?

“Hey! I just had a thought! You and the other bijou...”

The Kyuubi growled. “About them...?”

The prison laughed. “Well, that says a lot right there. I was going to ask if you guys get along!”

The Kyuubi was about to growl and chide the prison... until a thought occurred to it.

“Well, actually, that would depend on whether or not we’re bound at that point.”

“What?”

The Kyuubi growled, slightly. “Unless I’m in a human prison, I’m no more articulate than any other... all I am, Vessel, is rage, and hate, and the need to destroy. It’s only when I am imprisoned I have clarity of thought. So we can only be said to have opinions of the others when contained.”

The lip jutted out, childishly. “So, the only time you can appreciate being free... is when you aren’t? That... kinda stinks.”

The Kyuubi stopped mid growl. When put like that...

* * *

 **DAY 4: BLACKOUTS, BLISS, BALANCE**

“Iruka-san. Please do not tear the files; they have only just been declassified.”

At Ibiki’s dry tone, Umino Iruka relaxed his grip on the document in his hands. “My apologies, Morino-san. This is... I always knew things were occasionally rough for her, but... the casual unkindness is almost as bad as the attempted beatings. ”

“Ibiki,” the nin corrected. “More than half that file was black bands. Though do note that my fellow ANBU, regardless of their feelings, never let those attempts get too far.” He smirked at Iruka’s nod of acknowledgement, and then the head of Torture and Interrogation gave a wry little chuckle. “It was probably wise, classifying all this. If I had known... the question would have been where I started, not if I would act.”

The third and youngest member of their group set his stack of paper down. “It is... alternately disappointing and heartening, reading this. The number of people so foolish as to shun a jinchuuriki when this village has seen two of them in times past, both beloved as citizens... And the number so willing to risk being shunned socially while skirting the well meaning law to help her...” The young, silver-haired shinobi shook his head. “Utatane-sama is correct, we are only saved in that we can see our flaws if we let ourselves.”

“This really gets to you, doesn’t it, Shin?” Ibiki said.

The young Ne ANBU sighed. “I take my father’s mandate very seriously, Senpai. My division is the root of Konoha. We live for Konoha, and make it a place people wish to live for. We are the anchor of security, and the long root tapping information far and wide to nurture our home. This not only ensures the happiness of the village, but pragmatically-- one is more likely to give one’s all for a place one loves. The fact Naru-chan loves our village so much... and it is not a lie, either. You understand that, Iruka-senpai.”

Iruka nodded slowly. “You’d think she’d be screaming she loves it to keep herself from hating it, but she’s too much of a natural optimist for that. Konoha is her home.”

“Despite how some of them treat her,” Ibiki said, his voice darkening. Which was saying something. “Take this one... I have plans for him...”

Iruka’s face grew tighter as he read the report. “ _He_ spits at her? One would assume--”

“Only twelve of us knew initially,” Ibiki said, “the ones closest to the battle itself. He was not one. His team mate... died in the battle. Some figured it out later, like Hyuuga-sama-- which is why he practically wrestled the boy’s guardianship away from the Uchiha. As for Tani Ryu... I don’t think it even crossed his mind. The man’s lived in a haze of pain since that day. I can understand the resentment, but...”

“If he knew Uzumaki Kushina-sama personally,” Shin said coolly, “He should know a Jinchuuriki can be as stable as anyone else.”

Iruka kept reading, and his eyes narrowed. “He’s redirecting his own guilt.”

Shin raised an eyebrow.

Iruka pointed to the line that caught his ever observant eye and passed the file to Shin. “I’m not saying I’ll stop Morino-- Ibiki-san-- from acting. But I can see the progression now. He hasn’t used it since, notice.”

Shin considered the line in question and nodded slowly. “I see it,” the Ne said, then frowned. “But considering who their teachers were...“ He slowly smiled. “Actually... Senpai, if you would not mind, considering who Tani-san is... may I attempt to give him a second chance?”

Ibiki smirked. “Going to bend the rules, Shin-kun?”

“Only in the most amusing and laudable ways, Ibiki-nii.”

“Good boy, go to it.”

Iruka chuckled. The other two looked at the much respected academy sensei, who smiled a small smile. “Speaking of teachers... has anyone told... her?”

Shin grinned instantly, and Ibiki’s puzzled look faded as realization hit. “Why, no, Iruka,” the head of T&I said. “I do believe even Hiruzen-sama has neglected to tell her.”

The three men shared the smile of co-conspirators.

“I’ll compose the message,” Iruka said.

“I’ll get one of the messenger birds,” Ibiki offered.

“I think Sai has finally mastered that distant imaging jutsu...” Shin mused.

* * *

“I think it’s dead, Haruno-san.”

Sakura started, turning in a ready stance she knew was even sloppier than usual. Akunoyosha Meizu smirked. “Would have had you twice before you even stanced.”

“Likely,” Sakura said, measuring her disdain carefully.

“Still, you have the right attitude around me,” the Kirigakure nukenin said. “Haku-senpai’s proven himself, we haven’t.”

Sakura shrugged. “I’m trying to pay attention to my sensei these days.”

Meizu jerked his head toward the splintered sapling before her. “He get fresh?”

She looked at it, but didn’t entirely take her gaze off of the Oni, “Practising.”

“Maybe, but something’s on your mind,” Meizu said, kneeling next to her victim. “You’ll want to get those splinters removed.”

Sakura looked down at her hand, sure enough. “Damn it.” She started digging the bits of wood out. “Alright, so a little preoccupied.”

"Eager to get home-- stop that, you'll make the wounds worse. I meant see Haku about it.”

“I can--”

“Fuck up your hand to the point you’ll be out of action.”

“Like I’ve been in action!” Sakura hissed.

Meizu raised one eyebrow. “Speaking as one civilian born shinobi to another, stop fucking yourself over.” His voice was harsh, with a slight grate to it his twin lacked.

Sakura blinked. “... really?”

“I’ll bet it’s even rarer back home than in Konoha. The political climate there didn’t exactly encourage it. Anti-bloodline wasn’t the only bias the Mizukage encouraged, Haruno-san. C’mon, Haku-sempai is back at camp.”

They walked slowly in silence for a bit.

“Narukun... isn’t exactly popular back home,” Sakura said quietly. “Part of me is... scared to be her friend, scared of the stigma. I lost friendships, fan-girling after Sasuke. Add to that they’re the ‘Most Surprising Ninja’ and ‘Rookie of the Year’... I’m not as strong as I should be yet, even if I only look at me now compared to me a year ago...”

“Actually, I was telling Haku-senpai you probably are starting at the most solid ground of your whole team. He agreed.”

Sakura blinked. “I... compared to Narukun and Sasuke?”

Meizu stopped in his tracks and looked at her, the intensity of his gaze unwavering. “Compared to the young woman who was actively sabotaged-- who, by the way, is holding something that can level the village in her? Yes. Compared to the guy who, from what I hear, lived through a massacre on a scale not matched by many perpetrated by the one man everyone thought absolutely would not do such a thing? Yes. Fuck yes. From what I glean, you have so damn much they want, and take it for granted. A family that cares? Friendships to ruin in the first place? You’ve got a stability I’m envying, and I barely know you. Teachers should be chomping at the bit to teach you three. Do you realize the other hidden villages already fear the next generation of Konoha? You hear things out here. They call you the Konoha Nine, the three promising teams that graduated this year. The other villages scrape around for every scrap of information they can get about you. If you can find your balance, you three alone... your friend’s godfather had me trembling like a goddamn genin on an S class because he’s one of Konoha's Legendary Three. You three... have the inkling of being that, and better, if you find your balance.”

“The way you say that,” Sakura murmured as they started walking again.

“Balance? It was one of Zabuza-san’s favourite lectures,” Meizu said. “A good nin should count balance among their most important skills-- physical and mental. Start with finding your own personal points of balance. From there, the point you balance with your team... with your peers, with your village, and so on.”

“Until you balance with the world?” Sakura asked, a bit incredulous.

“No, you’re right,” Meizu agreed, with a hard but not unpleasant chuckle. “Balancing yourself, one, with the world as a whole is often a fool’s game. Maybe a sennin like Jiraiya... but no. There are too many unknown unknowns. You can only balance with the knowns and the known unknowns.”

“Known unknowns... the things you know you don’t understand yet...?”

“Right. You have to be able to recognize when information is missing. And understand none of us can see all the gaps. And accept that what is balance for you may look horribly insane to an outsider. Ah, here we are. Senpai! Need some splinter removal; the brat went overboard with her training.”

Sakura had a lot to think about as Haku-kun removed the wood from her hand and arm.

* * *

“I am going to make that girl and her intended the biggest batch of nikujaga ever...” Akimichi Asami muttered. “Even as a girl, she’s undernourished. Especially as a girl!”

Chouji blinked as his mother rose. Of all the reactions he had expected after carefully feeling out whether it was okay to share the details of Naruto-kun’s letter... this had been a distant dismissed one. Naruto-chan? Naw. Naruto-kun.

“That explains the petition Inoichi showed me,” Chouza muttered. “Her sensei seems keen on ending some of our less impressive customs regarding Uzumaki-sam...” His father trailed off, and Chouji decided not to press it. But that had been a cut off sama, not a san. He filed it away, the way Shikamaru had always said he should such ‘troublesome’ things. Maybe bijou jailers-- jinchuuriki, that was the word-- maybe they were more appropriately accorded more respect...

Instead of pursuing that, he asked, “Tousan... why all the secrecy?”

Chouza frowned in thought. “Some things I’m not cleared to share yet. But... understand, Chouji. Naruto’s entire life has been a balancing act between your friend’s safety and the pain caused by what she holds inside.” Chouza sighed. “Hopefully, this will lead to enough changes that more of our history can be shared. Some very noble people do not get their due right now because of the need for secrets...” Then he sniffed the air. “And hopefully your mother’s got enough beef for us to have some of that nikujaga...”

“She might not?” Chouji asked, a note of worry in his voice. His mother’s beef and potato stew was a glorious thing.

* * *

“I couldn’t get back to sleep,” Naruto explained, settling beside Hakun. “Where’s Sensei?”

“In the trees,” Hakun said, and her man had an arm around her instantly. Mm. Cool heaven. “He cannot, technically, allow either I or the twins a watch alone.”

“Probably taking the chance to read his Icha-Icha without risking Jirai-jiji going nuts on him.”

Hakun gave a small, barely there chuckle. They sat side by side looking into the fire a while.

“When you turn 15.”

She blinked-- and yes, damn it, she had been dozing, and it wasn’t her watch. She was allowed!

“What when I--”

“We’ll formally marry. Kakashi-san says that’s about as young as you can be in Konoha and not have too much... ill advised protest.”

She blinked, and hurriedly covered the blossoming dopey look on her face with a patented foxy grin. “And what if I’m not ready?”

In seconds she was draped halfway across his lap, his hands on her cheeks, his lips at hers, and his tongue requesting-- gaining entrance to her mouth.

They’d shared a couple of pecks. Innocent-- well, okay, not innocent, but a good deal chaster affection to them than this. This- this- evaded even poetry’s ability to pin down the sublime.

Hakun broke the kiss-- bastard-- and inclined his head to whisper in her ear.

“I am wondering how we’ll manage to wait, quite honestly.”

“Can we-- the lips and the hands and the tongue-- again, do it?”

* * *

 **DREAMTIME**

The Kyuubi raised one hand like paw to its face. Damn its prison for making it think.

“If I could choose only one person to hate... Madara.”

The girl nodded slowly, and then frowned. “Is it only because I made you choose, though? I mean, if my dad and Madara were in front of you...”

“Assuming I was still a thinking being... Yes. Madara.”

“Why?”

She sounded so honest in her interest. “Well, I can understand what the Shodai did and why your father would want me lessened and contained. Even unfettered, I’ve got survival instincts. I can understand that. But Madara...” The growl crept back in. “He used me.”

Its vessel nodded, slowly and thoughtfully. “You were a weapon to him. He didn’t _respect_ you.”

The demonic kitsune thought about the weight that word was given. “Yes. Your father at the very least... acknowledged me.”

Its container smiled, as if the Kyuubi had said some sort of magic word. Humans.

* * *

 **DAY FIVE: THE HARSH GLARE OF THE TSUN**

“What?” Jiraiya said, noticing everyone staring at him. Or rather, behind him. But that was silly, only two people alive could consistently get the drop on him. And Hiruzen wouldn’t exactly come and see their progress himself. That only left--

“Ero-Gama...”

It was very hard to swallow. Slowly, the sage of toads leaned his head back.

“Tsun-tsun,” he breathed.

Her fist hit him square on the forehead, earning a loud, “Ee-ja! That hurt!” as he toppled prone.

The blond vision standing over him was smiling far too sweetly. Kami, even in her early fifties, she was a vision!

“What did we forget to do?”

“I locked up the good sake on purpose-- **contact you! contact you!** ” he answered, raising his hands even as she readied her fist. “It was horrid of me! Terrible! Gamma-idiot!” He gave himself a token clunk on the head.

“Yes,” she agreed. “An academy chuunin had to use one of Ibiki’s **pigeons** to message me. And I didn’t even have any of the good sake to settle my nerves!”

“Well. You have to admit, you can’t sip it to save your life-- EE-JA!”

“Oi, Jirai-jiji...” Naruto said, and as his tormentor turned to the girl, Jiraiya sat up and smiled.

“My beautiful, youthful, attentive Tsunade has every right to beat me, Naruto,” Jiraiya said.

Naruto blinked. “Senju Tsunade...? You... Jirai-jiji says you’re the greatest inin ever, an’ the granddaughter of the First, an’ beautiful-- he was right about that--”

“Thank you.”

“Why are you beating up my godfather?”

“Because your godfather,” Tsunade said, kicking her heel into said godfather’s thigh and making him wince, “neglected to tell your godmother you needed us.”

Naruto looked at Tsunade, then at Jiraiya. “You’re my godmother?” At the woman’s nod, the look at the Senju-hime and the Gamma-sennin was repeated. “How’d he manage to marry you?”

“Hey!” Jiraiya whined.

Tsunade sighed. “... your dad helped talk me into it.”

“Oh.” Naruto reached out and patted the old woman’s arm. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

“Hey!” Jiraiya protested.

“It’s okay. He’s decent in bed.”

“Hey!” he echoed, but his warning glare merely earned an eye roll.

“Plus, he’s somewhat cute when he gets indignant. Some of us love men like that,” Tsunade advised her in a stage whisper.

“Meh, to each their own. Speaking of, that’s mine,” Naruto grinned, pointing at Haku. The boy sat up straighter under the inin’s glare, whereas the twins seemed to want to be looking at anyone else. "Believe it!"

“Nice,” Tsunade admitted. “Kakashi, look at you!” Jiraiya allowed himself a small chuckle as his wife pinched the jounin’s masked cheek. And what always happened when Tsunade got maternal with him happened.

“Hello, Tsunade-hime-sama,” Kakashi managed.

“Look at you, Mr. I’ll Never Pass a Genin Team!”

“It is an important team, Hime-sama,” Kakashi murmured.

“And your sensei’s daughter! Teaching her just as he wished!”

“Hai, Hime-sama,” Kakashi stammered.

Jiraiya grinned as he stood. “From cool and hip to--”

“Look! It’s Daddy!” Tsunade said with a smirk.

The grin was replaced by primal panic. “Oh, no--”

There was a squealing oink of joy, and Jiraiya once again found himself knocked prone-- this time under a decent sized, quite affectionate pig.

“Hi, Tonton,” ‘Daddy’ managed.

“Squee!”

“Yeah, missed you too-- Shizune, did you have to let her go?”

The dark haired girl smiled apologetically, “You know how she is when I miss my cues, Ji-sama.”

“Right, right. Any chance I can get up, Tonton-kun?”

“Oink.”

“Didn’t think so,” Jiraiya grumbled.

“Is that your pig, Baa-chan?” Naruto asked.

“Baa-- do I look like a grandmother?” Tsunade muttered to her apprentice. Shizune wisely stayed silent on the matter.

“She’s so kawaii!” Sakura said. “Aren’t you?”

Somehow, Tonton conveyed her thanks and the fact that was obvious in one oink.

* * *

“You’ll never be a inin,” Tsunade noted, and nodded as Naruto shrugged. Other than the baa-chan thing, she found the girl to be so many of the things that made Minato and Kushina so... special... mixed up and producing new, amazing things. The miracle of children.

“Sakura-chan,” Naruto said, grinning. “ _She’s_ got the control to be a inin, I bet!”

Tsunade looked at Shizune, and they both looked at Sakura.

“Really?” Tsunade said.

The pink haired genin was blushing and nervous, even as she stroked a rather enraptured Tonton’s belly. Ah, good, she hadn’t lost the “Clinical Glare”. It was a good form of killing intent for a inin to cultivate, appraising to just the degree you focused it. It could make a patient pay attention, a target pray for the chakra scalpel... or let a possible apprentice know they were being sized up.

“You’d have to stay in Konoha to teach her, Hime-sama,” Kakashi noted.

“I thought as much, Kakashi-kun,” she said, and she knew he was blushing as he had back when he was a new jounin far too young. “If she proves interesting, it will be worth it.”

“Why would you avoid Konoha, Baa-chan?”

Something told Tsunade that once Naruto chose a term of affection, it would take... actually, she wasn’t sure she had any idea of how to change it. So she bit back the correction and smiled sadly. “I love Konoha, Naruto; don’t get me wrong... but my brother and... someone I cared about--”

“Dan was a good man, and he was with you first,” Jiraiya said flatly, and she spared him an annoyed, but fond look.

“They... both died during the last Shinobi War. The one that was part of the World War.” Tsunade looked into the fire. “It took your father and one of Konoha’s greatest elders to get me back on my feet. Even then, I’ve been spending time away, helping your godfather build up Ne’s informant network...”

“Ne?” Sasuke asked voice sharp.

“Yes,” Tsunade said sadly. She noted Naruto and Sakura looking puzzled and made a note to explain later. “I... met your brother, once or twice.” She shook her head. “Too much about that night makes no sense whatsoever...”

Sasuke gave a little displeased ‘Hn’, “I’m coming to see that myself. And not in the ways I thought.”

“We’re talking to the elders when we get back,” Kakashi said.

“Well, if Sakura-chan proves to be equal to the task, that’s three reasons I’ll have to stay at home for a while. Train her, help sort out the Uchiha mess, and keep my promise.”

Naruto looked up at her. “What... what promise was that...?”

Tsunade smiled at the young girl before her. “Well... since my chakra control is so good, and you Uzumaki tend to have so much of it, I promised your mother if she wasn’t there, I’d help you--”

Of all Naruto’s possible responses, stressed out wailing and being clung to was the... second last on Tsunade’s list. The last time anyone had broken out into song for her... well, that fifth year of marriage...

She awkwardly patted the girl’s shoulder, and the crying actually got worse.

“I’m sorry,” Naruto managed. “It’s just that-- a month ago, I only had Iruka-sensei and Jiji and maybe Ayame and her dad that _acknowledged me_ , and now I’ve got a fiance, and my team mates care, and I’ve got a godfather and godmother, and my sensei knew my dad, and it’s so much at once!”

As the Slug Princess cuddled the sobbing girl, she looked at the rag tag group heading back to Konoha. The intensity of the Hyouton user’s gaze earned him several points, and his twin friends showed admirable loyalty, the one obviously struggling not to snarl, the other-- she could tell his mind was calculating something terrible to be done to anyone who tried to harm his friend’s betrothed. Sakura was moving beside Naruto already, and the Uchiha was flexing his hand awkwardly. His frown spoke volumes.

Her gaze settled on Kakashi.

 _I’m already working on it,_ he signalled in the old code Jiraiya and Minato had created back in Minato’s genin days. She nodded slowly. That was a start... but as they returned, she’d get a full accounting.

And then, she’d decide exactly how much of her Senju Fury her sensei and advisers would face.

After Kakashi was done, of course. It was his team.

* * *

“So the Hyuuga are on board?”

“Hiashi is,” Kakashi corrected quietly. He was more comfortable around the Legendary Slug now that things were down to business. Though he couldn’t help the lingering thought that the Gamma-sennin was a very lucky man. “You know how they are. It might take him a while to shut up the elements calling for his head, but the Hyuuga don’t have a council running things. He’s law.”

“As long as he can keep his fellow Souke members from resenting it enough to oust him,” Jiraiya noted.

Kakashi chuckled. “Actually, he’s pretty much sharing clan sentiment here-- whether due to thinking it lacks decorum to treat Naruto badly or being more invested in it, as Hiashi-sama is, most in the Hyuuga will support this, I think. Souke and Bunke. And as Naruto’s true gender means that there is less threat Hiashi’s daughter will overwhelm her off springs' limit with the Uzumaki vitality, fewer of the older members will resist their friendship.”

“Bah,” the Namekuji-sannin said.

“I know. You gave your considered opinion when Hiashi-sama enquired. The kekkei genkai may seem to vanish, but it will likely emerge stronger within a generation or two,” Kakashi added, smiling. “Hiashi-samma and **I** know to listen to the established expert.”

“Good boy.”

“Haruno’s mother is also an important factor, dear,” Jiraiya said. At his wife’s raised eyebrow, the sage continued. “They have a minor kekkei genkai... something to do with the hair of the women... so she is on both the Citizen and Clan Council. And she’s rather respected, which tends to surprise those playing to Shinobi Superiority. Never lets the civilians forget who protects the village; never lets the nins forget who brings in the trade and goods. I’ve had occasion to report to her when the Citizen Council is being briefed by Ne.”

“As it should be,” Tsunade noted. “Speaking of, any one on any council explicitly aiming shuriken at our girl’s head?”

“Most are neutral, but there’s a...” Kakashi gritted his teeth, “disturbing--”

“Talk plain, we’d both prefer it,” Jiraiya said.

Kakashi nodded. “There’s at least one dean of idiots in the Merchant and Manufactures' Council who has made clear any claims about Naruto will be taken at face value and reported damages to merchants repatriated from a special fund. It may be an organized group, or one or two of the guilds each working on their own to ‘seed’ their members against her. Thus, the brat gets a reputation as a thief and vandal... beyond what her pranks cause. And the pranks are usually easily fixed misdemeanours at worst. These accusations are often felonies. People are willing to lie for the money, and even her minor infractions are inflated. Instant undeserved reputation. Ibiki’s been chomping at the bit to clean things up.”

“Is he now being allowed to?” Hime-sama asked with deceptive lightness.

“Shin’s heading the effort,” Kakashi said, and his smile was as evil as Tsunade’s and Jiraiya’s.

“Shin’s such a good boy,” Tsunade cooed dangerously.

“Anko and Hokuto apparently drafted themselves to help,” Jiraiya added.

“You’re just trying to butter me up now. You know I love those girls.”

“Yes,” Jiraiya said with a weak chuckle. He licked his lips nervously and his tone grew a bit anxious. “Is it working?”

“Maybe...”

Kakashi cleared his throat. “Also, the Aburame boy has already returned Naruto’s note, offering to spar and discuss things with her. He’ll likely want to talk to you as well, Jiraiya-sama-- he made comparisons to his clan’s bugs and how Naruto and the Kyuubi might interact.”

“Sounds like a smart boy,” Jiraiya said.

“He is. Kurenai’s got a good team. They all need polish,” Kakashi admitted. “But... I think the other villages are right to worry about these nine. Though, on a somewhat worrying note...”

“Yes?” Tsunade said, and her voice promised doom unlike any other.

“The Yamanaka girl sent the letter Naruto wrote back unopened. She _did_ include a note saying to tell her when we got back, that she was too busy to read a long note. It is odd, I expected her need for gossip to at least... well.”

“Kakashi... perhaps I misunderstood... but was not the letter formatted as an official communication?”

Kakashi nodded slowly, eyeing the Senju-hime warily. “Yes. I insisted, in case any of their parents tried to pry or refuse.”

“Paper,” Tsunade growled. “Do we still have the letter the brat wrote?”

Kakashi produced it.

“Official seals and all. Your seal approving the others as well. They _are_ still taught to recognize such in the Academy, correct?” Kakashi nodded. “Her parents’ names?”

“She’s Inoichi’s girl,” Jiraiya said.

If anything, Tsunade’s face grew sterner. “Inoichi’s daughter should have better manners. I’ll advise him to correct her.”

“Are we going for raw emotion, or--” Jiraiya started to ask.

“Jiraiya, you will polish this into a finely honed, piercing barb that will make clear a key new reality of Konoha,” Tsunade answered.

There was a pause both men decided it was best not to break before the Slug Princess was ready.

Tsunade took the offered scroll and pen.

“Nobody fucks with our goddaughter. Nobody.”

* * *

 **DAY SIX: GETTING THE HOUSE IN ORDER**

“She sent it back?” Akimichi Chouji said, frowning, pausing midway into reaching into his bag of crisps. Iruka just smiled when their eyes met. He knew damn well, even after providing them with a fine breakfast from the selections Ichiraku offered while getting ready for the lunch rush, that Chouji needed his crisps the way Hyuuga Hinata needed to release excess tension with a press of her fingers.

Nara Shikamaru nodded, solemn flavouring his usually laid back manner. “That she would revel in ignorance... troublesome. She tried to get me to catch up on it like it was a bit of gossip once she learned we had all got one... though breaking this particular law for her... too problematic. But that is why she is not here.”

Iruka looked at the assembled members of his recently graduated class. “Understandable. You couldn’t invite her here without breaking the law, at this point.”

“I do not recall Naruto and Ino being close, but she never seemed to suffer those that would torment him...” Aburame Shino reasoned. “It wasn’t sent in the manner of a personal note... perhaps she dismissed it as minor as it was from Naruto? Or assumed a prank?”

“His sensei-- _her_ sensei signed it too,” Chouji said. “I mean, isn’t that a tip off?”

Shikamaru sighed. “Sometimes Ino can be... rather hasty to prioritize things out of convenience rather than true consideration,” he said, and actually looked a little pained to admit the failing of a childhood friend.

There was a lull, and then Hinata spoke. “Sensei, I hope we are not imposing-- Otousan had concerns our home would attract too much attention as a meeting place, and--”

Iruka raised a hand. “No, no. I’m glad to lend you my home, modest though it may be.”

Shino raised an eyebrow, and then it fell. “Ah. Sorry, Sensei. I forgot you grew up with family and clan around you. That would make such a fine home seem empty.”

Iruka bowed his head in thanks for the compliment and the understanding.

“Naruto...” Inuzuka Kiba said slowly. “He... she said... that you were there when she found out about the fox.”

“I can’t really share details...” Iruka said slowly. “Neither can she. And yes, we are all finding that... rather confusing. What exactly did she tell each of you...?”

“I talked to each of the others personally, though I have not seen the missives,” Shino said. “It seems we all know of the fox, which she does not blame us for any... untoward actions we may have performed due to the impressions we got from our elders...”

Hinata frowned, “That really annoys you, Shino-kun...”

“My father and mother... they not only never spoke ill of Uzumaki-kun, but stated that the perception many have of... her... is flawed. It is some of my other clan mates that cause me shame.” The Aburame actually pulled down his mask as his kikaichuu bugs gave a low buzz. This in itself was odd; the naked disappointment on his face was even worse. “While rationality should never be mistaken as the absence of emotion, the degree to which they allow the flaws in human thinking to overturn theirs... I’m angry at them, Hinata-chan, yes.”

“To be honest, I’m a bit angry at my generation as well,” Iruka admitted. “Myself included. I feel as if--”

“You have not failed Naru-chan!” Hinata protested, and promptly blushed as every eye around the kitchen table they sat at turned to her. “I... you’ve always been there for her. It’s... more than some of us have done. Though... Otousan _did_ say things limited him from helping as much as he’d like...”

“We’re working on changing that,” Iruka said firmly.

“Is that why I saw the Ne ANBU’s most lauded member, the master infiltrator, and a special jounin noted for her non-lethal apprehension jutsu going through the stores?” Shikamaru wondered offhandedly. This, Iruka knew, meant the Nara _knew_ that the visits were connected.

Iruka smirked, but knew better than to try to get the lazy genius to expound. “Yes. It is. At least one of them... knew Naruto’s parents.”

“How we could let the daughter of one of our greatest Hokage’s be treated this way worries me,” Shino noted. Catching the looks of surprise, he frowned. “No? Not even you, Nara-san?”

Nara nodded slowly. “I see it now. She obviously takes after her father with the hair and eyes. But, there’s surprisingly little about the Yondaime's wife in--”

Shino dropped a few sheets of neatly folded paper on the table. “From the family library. I... have a feeling my parents deliberately missed me taking it.”

Hinata slowly unfolded the paper as Iruka gave Shino a small smile. “Officially, I can neither confirm nor deny this.”

Shino’s nod and small smile showed the mountains of praise in Iruka’s own expression were received.

“That... Tousan nearly called her Uzumaki-sama,” Chouji said, setting his bag down. “I thought maybe it was ‘cause she was holding the Kyuubi... but it’s this.”

“Knowing that bastard, she’d likely hate being called that,” Kiba said with a smirk as he grabbed a few of the sheets.

“He... if she looks almost the same...” Hinata murmured.

“Hatake-sensei says she does,” Iruka noted.

“She has her mother’s face,” Hinata whispered. “The... shape of it. And... the whisker marks...”

“This says she was born with them,” Kiba said, reading one of the papers. “Before the fox was even in her. That her mom had them. Her mom held the fox before her.”

There was a moment’s silence.

“Otousan...” Hinata said. “He said that he was friends with Naru-chan’s dad. He... he said she didn’t mention it... he thinks it was so I’d be her friend because I wanted to be _her_ friend. I... I think it’s the same with all of us.”

Kiba’s face set. “Even if he’s a she... even if her parents had been a couple of garbage collectors, even if they are our greatest heroes... she’s still the brat I got into trouble with.”

Iruka licked his lips. “The Hokage once told me... that the worse thing one can do to another is not ignoring them, or hate them. It is to deliberately _not_ acknowledge them. Even if you factor them into your plans, even if you know they are a factor in what you do, to their face you treat them as not worth any consideration. As if they are a thing to be dealt with rather than a person.”

He looked up at his recent grads and was about to apologize for slipping into lecture mode during their visit, when an inspiration struck him. “Hatake-san is pacing their travel so they’ll be seeing the gates in a day on any approved approach route. By the next afternoon, at the latest, they’ll be here.

“When they come, watch the people on the streets. Watch how they react to her. Watch them with an eye looking underneath the underneath. Then... treat Naruto as you would any friend being exposed to that.”

* * *

 **DREAMTIME**

“I am beyond gender,” the Kyuubi said, slowly and as if talking to a child.

The vessel sighed. “I guess. It’s just... when we refer to something as ‘it’, we mean a thing. Not something alive and thinking.”

The Kyuubi was silent for a long moment.

“He. I guess. I mean, your bastard father--”

“Hey, my-” She stopped. “Actually he might have been. I’ll have to ask Jiraiya...”

“Want me to stick to idiot until then?” The Kyuubi asked.

“Eh, I’m just bantering. Go on.”

That was interesting, having a jibe taken in good humour. “When your father, for highly justifiable but none the less annoying to me reasons--”

“Thank you.”

“--you’re welcome-- contained me, he left only my yang chakra. Well, bit of the Yang, otherwise I'd cease to exist. But, I understand you typically generalize it as male.”

“Inaccurately,” the brat muttered.

Kyuubi gave her a look.

“I... like to read,” the girl grumbled. “Why does that surprise people? Its how I learned most of my best jutsus, reading and doing...”

* * *

Hyuuga Yachi frowned. “Your candour is probably the most useful thing I’ve come across all day, Saito-san. It is still quite... vexing.”

Even stripped of her geisha make-up, and her dark hair down in a more relaxed style, the woman everyone know better than to nickname Hiashi’s watchdog carried herself with grace. That said grace could go from seductive to caring to deadly mid-blink was but one reason the Bunke Hyuuga was a respected member of her clan.

Right now, her elegance was diplomatic, sipping tea with a member of the Textiles and Clothiers guild as a representative of the Hyuuga as a whole. Here as a courtesy to a clothier who had made most of the clan’s formal wear since Hyuuga Hinata’s birth.

Saito Sugi held up the tea pot, and Yachi nodded. “I agree, Hyuuga-san. In truth, I am glad someone is finally asking about this.”

“You say your guild head was accompanied by two members of the Weapon smiths?”

“Two of Koshiko’s apprentices.”

Yachi’s face grew tight. “I see. I would not expect a man capable of such sterling work to be so... indiscreet. When the ANBU come, please mention Hiashi is sending Kou by to assist in your protection from reprisal.”

The tailor blinked. “Hyuuga Kou, Yachi-san? I--”

“Yes,” Yachi sighed with a smile. “The poor boy’s been going spare, now that Hinata is considered a genin. He is not needed to safe guard his dear little cousin as much.”

“I... thank you, Yachi-san,” Sugi said. “If... I may ask one further favour...?”

Yachi raised one perfect eyebrow in answer.

“The boy’s costume... he was buying fabric for it here, before... I had hoped to give him one of our full kits, before--”

Yachi raised one perfectly manicured hand. “Sugi-san. I have no doubt you will soon enough be able to give this gift to Uzumaki Naruto yourself.”

The smile on Yachi’s face booked no argument.

* * *

Tani Ryu woke up at noon with a hangover ringing in his head and a kunai pressing against his throat.

“I am sorry to disturb you in this fashion, Tani-sama. Please, excuse the ink.”

Ryu’s chest grew tight and his mind reeled. Everyone in town knew that phrase.

“N-not at all, Shimura-kun. D-does... your father wish to address something with me?”

He saw inky black... things that disappeared as he tried to focus on them. Oh, will of fire, why did this happen now, when he was an old washed up shinobi who had failed so many!

The Ne ANBU chuckled lightly. “Now, now, if Otousan wanted to address you, he’d do it directly. And if I were ‘addressing’ you for him, I’d already have cut your dick off.”

Ryu clenched his body. No. He would not void himself, even with the Inky Black Darkness threatening his life.

“To be honest, Tani-sama, I am here to hopefully ease your life in future. But... my father keeps saying I need to socialize more. Realizing this is the only way I knew how to introduce myself in this context was rather sobering.” Shimura Sai sighed and withdrew his knife.

Ryu relaxed to a more ready state. “Would it be alright if I sit up, then?”

“Please. It would actually make this easier. And I suppose I am a guest of sorts.”

Ryu slowly sat up. “I... regret I have no refreshment ready--”

“Eh. Your sake is too cheap for my tastes, though I suppose you are not buying it for the flavor. Attend.”

The young shinobi dropped a picture on the bed before him. “This is your genin team, correct?”

Ryu had to take a minute. “Yes. Yes it is.”

“Your sensei, team mates-- what were they to you, honestly?”

“... As blunt as they say,” Ryu murmured, a rueful smile on his face.

“It is alternately a blessing and a curse.”

“... do you know my history? What my family was like?”

Sai nodded slowly. “And that affected how you saw your team?”

“They...” Ryu sighed. “Sai-kun, they gave me everything that my bastard father never did. They made my mother’s last years a joy. I-- would have married one of them.”

Sai nodded slowly. “That... is encouraging. Did you plan the future together, then?”

Ryu couldn’t help the heart ache that crept into his voice, as he ran a hand over hair that had not been properly buzzed in years. “We planned so much... before the Kyuubi...”

Shimura Sai was silent a long moment. “I am going to show you three pictures now, Tani Ryu. It may be painful to see them, but I hope... I hope they will tell you what your friends would have you do.”

The first picture made his guts tighten. The second brought tears.

The last, a fine portrait in graceful ink with a few lines of notes below it, made his eyes widen and his voice seize up.

“I... I...”

“Your sensei has left a glowing report. He has never doubted if you were to rise to what you were... you would be among our best again. But never mind that.”

Shimura Sai leaned close. “Speaking as an orphan, the greatest day of my life was when someone simply recognized my needs... and filled them, because not doing so would be wrong.”

Ryu closed his eyes, tears falling as they had that dark day when he heard his lover, his friend, his friend’s wife, the child... that they were all dead, all gone.

“I... cut hair in our household,” the boy offered. And suddenly, he sounded very much like a boy. “They’re-- on their way here; the gate guards have reported seeing them.”

He managed to smile for the boy. “I... thank you, yes. I need to bathe first though.”

“I’ll wait. I have some... documentation for you to review, in this case.”

Ryu got out from under the covers, and paused. Thankfully, he had left his trousers on. He rose, and headed to the washroom.

* * *

The man in charge of the Leaf’s Own Shinobi Bank had on one of the finest shinobi business outfits, uwagi and zubon cut more for style that battle, obi ornate and distracting. New for this season. He stood in the bank’s lobby/ waiting area, flanked by chuunin guards commanded by the sort of jounin only one of Konoha’s oldest, most trusted banks could hire. The live plants, planted from shoots from Konoha’s Heart, were a cherished gift from the Yondaime, and the floor was marble from the lands west of the Elemental Continent. Expensive.

The man stood nervously between the two shinobi that had refused his invitation to his office.

“I am so glad you brought this to my attention, Shin-san. I did not know this vital fact,” Hiashi said. He turned toward the bank manager, by now wringing his hands between the Ne ANBU and the clan head. “I will be withdrawing all my funds, and my clan’s funds, in total. Now.”

“S-surely Hyuuga-sama...”

“I’m sorry, Hyuuga-sama,” a new voice said. “Did I hear you correctly?”

Hiashi turned and gave his daughter’s sensei a polite smile. “That depends on what you heard, Yuuhi-sensei...?”

“That you were withdrawing all funds under your control from this bank?”

“Ah. Sadly, yes, and I must ask that if you were bringing Hinata here to cash or deposit her mission pay, you no longer do so.”

The dark haired genjutsu master frowned, which made her face dangerously closed as opposed to its usual reserve. “I see. I will of course abide by your wishes, but may I ask why? I have used this bank for years.”

“A guard who worked here informed us that a shinobi of Konoha was refused service here,” Shin explained.

Kurenai raised her eyebrows. “I see. How unfortunate. I will need to follow suit, then. Regretful.”

“Yuuhi-san,” the bank manager began, “I’m sure once I explain-- the boy is a known troublemaker--”

Kurenai reeled on the banker. “If said ‘boy’ is Uzumaki Naruto, you had best stop there. If you insult a friend of his daughter-- my student-- in front of Hyuuga-sama... one you have made your ignorance about plain... I am not sure either he or I would be inclined to stop the ANBU in attendance from correcting you.”

Shin smiled more and more pleasantly as she spoke.

“I will be withdrawing my funds as well,” another voice barked. “Clan and personal.”

The three standing in front of the banker parted as Inuzuka Tsume came forward, face molded in a snarl worthy of one of her ninken. “And if you are not penniless for what you did to my son’s friend by the end of the day, it’s only because we have left you the dregs.”

The banker fell to his knees and wet himself. Tsume growled.

“I’m sorry, I thought this was a shinobi bank.”

Kurenai smirked. “I suppose it’s one that has got incredibly soft. Shin, if he’s here babbling too long--”

The Ne’s smile was now supremely pleasant, to the point of being disturbing to many in the area. “Oh, the ANBU will of course exercise the seizure and return clause of the Shinobi Bank Guarantee. The Nidaime’s idea. Wonderfully expedient-- oh! It even has an acceleration clause should the bank representative go foetal!”

“Remarkable foresight on the Nidaime’s part,” Hiashi said lightly, as Shin ducked out.

As the Ne ANBU returned with several of his masked counterparts, announcing the seizure, and as the chuunin guards and even the jounin commander began _helping_... the Hokage walked in.

The bank manager met the Old Professor’s gaze... and whimpered at the slightest touch of killing intent, voiding himself further.

“Really, Azusa. You were in the last war...” he chided. “Shin?”

“Hai, Sarutobi-sama. Akai Neko!” A violet haired ANBU whose mask resembled a cat’s face with three red marks on it was instantly before him. “The Hokage’s token, please!” Shin instructed her. She bowed and set off for the vault, gesturing for a teller and a bank chuunin to follow. One of her fellow ANBU in a similar mask with blue replacing the red instantly joined her.

This made the banker get to his knees. “N-no! No, please, Hokage-sama, at least leave us that! We can rebuild, as--”

“As long as you hold a token deposit from me, your certification as a shinobi bank stands,” Hiruzen finished. He leaned closer to the nin turned banker. “I eat ramen with the child on a regular basis. Not just the birthday bowl all the orphans get. That should have warned you by itself.” He stood, and turned to an ANBU with a peafowl mask. “Kajaku.” He gestured to the plants growing by the door. “Minato would _not_ want _those_ growing here.”

“Hokage.”

Hiruzen turned, ignoring the thud from in front of him as Kajaku gathered the plants for transport. “You’re early, Ibiki.”

“He’s passed out, Hokage-- is that Azusa of the Endless Assault?”

“Mm. Apparently, the Assault _has_ ended. Take him. Full treatment for him and a beginning probe for the tellers. Find out who deserves my leniency, Ibiki.”

“Hai, Hokage-sama.”

The Hokage looked up to find three of his finest looking back. “What? Oh, Tsume-kun. Did you want to toy with him more?”

“Shin?” Hiashi asked.

“Danzou’s already salivating over what the files might show,” Hiruzen admitted. “And... Danzou suggested I could no longer be so... neutral on these matters, to help set a new tone--”

He blinked as the three bowed low. “Oh, stop, stop. I swear you people know that annoys me. Decorum, yes-- Hiashi, stop!”

* * *

“Good afternoon... Shimura-sama,” the woman behind the bakery counter managed, bowing. She swallowed.

“Good afternoon, Yagi-san,” the Darkness of the Shinobi said. “I am correct, yes?”

“Hai, Shimura-sama. May I... help you?”

Danzou nodded pleasantly. “In a moment. I’m meeting someone here, and your bakery was highly recommended by a mutual acquaintance. Ah, here he is now.”

The man in question was wearing a black, stylish jinbei, suitable to the recent spate of warmish weather. The man had a large grin. “Danzou-sama! It is an honour to meet you face to face, _at last_! One of our _greatest_ shinobi!”

“Oh. You flatter an old nin, Kogami-san. Or perhaps, we shall simply address each other as the friends we will undoubtedly become?”

The man looked earnestly touched. “If... Danzou, it would be an **honour**! Now, Narukun recommends this place so highly. We _must_ try as much as we can stand!”

“Kousei,” the shinobi said to the yakuza boss, “I could not disagree less. Yagi-san, please, my friend and I would like a broad sampling of your product-- especially anything favoured by Naruto and his academy sensei.”

Yagi Hatsumi looked at the two men and grinned. “ _Riyouki_! Endless Sweets Platter!”

“Oh! Endless Sweets Platter!” Kousei grinned. “I _do_ like that sound of that.”

A man stuck his head out of the back. “Hatsumi, are you sure? The last group to order-- **Shimura-sama**! Endless Sweets Platter, coming right up!” The man turned back to the back of the bakery cafe.

“Riyouki!”

“Hai?” the man said, adjusting his glasses as he turned back.

“Do it the way Naruto-kun and Iruka-san like it.”

The man’s face grew even brighter. “Yes, darling.”

“Milk tea?” Hatsumi offered.

“ **Yes**!” Kousei agreed, as Danzou claimed a seat. Then, suddenly, he grew somber. It was as if all his exuberance had become seriousness. “Yagi-san... Hatsumi-chan. I could not help but notice, your signage... it has been... damaged.”

Hatsumi bit her lip. “Yes, that... happens on occasion. We simply haven’t been able to afford a replacement yet.”

“Do you know... who is doing this?”

Hatsumi glanced at Shimura-sama a moment. “I am reluctant to place blame.”

In an instant, Danzou’s sleeve was rolled up, and he had tapped a complex design on the now exposed skin. In moments, a masked ANBU entered.

“Danzou-sama.”

“Inoshishi. Yagi-sama’s sign is being vandalized. She has reason to believe it is a shinobi or group thereof. Regardless, Kogami-sama and I are arranging a replacement.” He sipped at the tea that Kousei placed before him. “Ah, excellent. If our involvement is not enough to deter the miscreants...?”

“The watch I shall set will catch them,” the boar masked ANBU said evenly. “Shinobi or not, Ibiki-senpai will be given a chance to ask them about their intentions.”

“I have no doubt.”

Hatsumi’s husband had to ask her for help four times before she realized she was staring.

* * *

The two kunoichi turned very slowly.

“I’m sorry, what did you just say...?” Mitarashi Anko asked in a tone that would have screamed, ‘This is your last chance to not fail at survival,’ to anyone with half a brain.

Showing a remarkable lack of the instincts to prevent such failure, the rotund man met Anko’s eyes and said, “I said, snake bitch, loose women like you have no business being shinobi and the little oni deserves all he gets--”

A stream of water threw the man back against the wall. Soon, Hino Hokuto was doing the holding instead. “Let me explain exactly what your little lack of tact there means, little man,” she whispered harshly in his ear. The woman with the nori green hair smiled politely as Anko went to the door and flipped the sign to CLOSED. Her tone was now that of a woman discussing a movie she saw last night in a cafe the next day. “We were here merely as follow up on a citizen’s... observations. If we found anything worth following up, we would report to Ibiki-sama, and you be brought in for a polite chat. Did we find anything interesting, Anko-chan?”

Anko turned from the windows she was absently looking out. “Just a bigoted bastard and a rundown shop, Hoku-kun. I was all for passing him off to Civilian Relations for a warning.” She turned back to the window, and something caught her eye. “Oh. Be right back.”

As Anko stuck her head out the door and called out to someone, Hokuto continued. “I was for that too. But then, you had to go and break one of the Hokage’s laws.”

“Law? What law?” the man managed. “What? You’re going to pretend you don’t know what’s inside the brat--?”

Hokuto laughed a shallow laugh and then tightened her grip. “Not that one. The one that says you treat all citizens with equality and fairness. See, before, you were just a merchant serving who he wished. Now--”

The door’s bell rang.

“Whatever is it, Anko-chan?” a refined voice said.

“Yachi-san!” Anko squealed like a little-girl. “Yachi-san, that mean man called me ‘snake bitch’, an’ said me an’ Hoku-kun were loose women, an’ that we had no right bein’ nins, an’ he called that cute little brat Naru-chan an _oni_!”

The Hyuuga watchdog fixed her glare on the man, going from refined geisha to hardened killer with one look as her arms wrapped around Anko, pale eyes bulging as her Byakugan activated.

“There, there, dear. We’ll... educate... this poor man on manners before he has a nice, long chat with your senpai.”

Anko turned to look at the man, blood lust in her eyes. “We’ll have to educate him a lot, oneesan. I wouldn’t want Ibiki-senpai to get offended.”

“You-- you can’t do this! Shinobi can’t terrorize the village like this! I’m a civilian-- that **geisha** isn’t even a true shinobi--”

“Are you under the impression I’m going to do something as pedestrian as _hurt_ you, little man?” Yachi said, smiling ever so slightly. “You forget we ‘loose women’ are armed with more weapons than blades and staff...”

* * *

The Hokage looked at the man before him. He was making the jounin sweat a bit, perhaps needlessly. Sai had already briefed him...

But he wanted to see, to make sure.

“Ibiki’s been keeping an eye on you,” Hiruzen said.

The nin bit his lip. “I... I would have, as well, Hokage-sama. My behaviour... I was given every opportunity... and I have wasted them. It should not have taken...” He sighed. “I have many excuses. But I have no excuse.”

The Professor nodded slowly. “Very well, Tani-san. I have a single condition to granting your request, and a task while you exercise it.”

The jounin with a shaven head and a red strip of fabric tying on a hitai-ate that had been polished to gleaming nodded. “Hai, Hokage-sama.”

“The condition is this: Whatever happens, however Uzumaki Naruto reacts to you... you accept it, and carry on from there as someone of your rank with dignity.”

Tani Ryu’s face grew even grimmer. “Hai, Hokage-sama.”

“Very well. You will deliver this note to Hatake-san, and travel back to Konoha as the group’s escort. I also expect a report on your first impressions of the three nukenin travelling with them after we debrief Team Hatake.”

“Hai, Hokage-sama,” Tani said, taking the scroll.

“And Tani?”

The nin met his Kage’s eyes.

“Please. Do not waste this second chance. It would bring me more heartache to an already burdened life.”

Tani blinked a few times. “H-hai, Hiruzen-sama.”

“Dismissed.”

* * *

“Ino. Please come in.”

Yamanaka Ino swallowed deeply her father’s voice came out of his study. That was his all so gentle reprimand voice. She was in trouble. As she approached the door, she mentally catalogued all the events of the past few days. No, she couldn’t quite finger what she might have done...

She started at the sight on the desk before her. A toad and a slug. Some how... bigger than they should be. Sitting as Hatake-san’s ninken had. Messengers.

“Ino, Uzumaki Naruto sent you a letter recently,” her father started. He placed a scroll before her. “Would you mind telling me what you see sealing this letter?”

Ino picked up the scroll and looked at it, intently. “Uzumaki’s name. And an official... no, several official business seals. And.. Hatake-- his sensei’s seal.”

Her father nodded. “Given all that, do you have a good reason that it was returned, unopened? It seems even his sensei thought it important enough to seal it...”

Ino bit her lip. “I... admit. I was in a hurry and might not have noticed the full gravity of it. Naruto-kun is... a bit goofy. I thought it could wait until he returned. I sent him a note saying such...”

Her father waited, and the realization slowly came.

“But if I had time to write that, I had time to at least check the note’s importance.”

Her father nodded sadly. “Indeed. And now, you have upset two people that apparently care for Naruto-kun deeply as well. They have sent their own messengers.” He gestured to the desk. “Senju Tsunade was particularly upset, and asked if I had taken any hand in your training at all.”

The bottom fell out of Ino’s stomach. “Senju... Tsunade...?” The full implications of what her father had said hit her, and she flung herself at him, hugging him tightly. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!” To suggest to a member of the Shodai’s clan that her father had not properly trained her...!

Her father patted her back gently. “It is good you regret this. But Ino... I am not the one you need to apologize to.”

They separated and Ino looked at the letter, and her father’s laid out writing implements.

“Hint hint,” she murmured.

Her father stood, and ran his hand through her hair on his way out. “Please do take it, dear.”

After he was gone, Ino sat down. “Gimme a minute?” She said to the messenger summons.

“Sure,” the slug said in a manner that would have made Shikamaru proud.

There was a moment, and then the toad asked, “Got any candy?”

The slug seemed to be glaring daggers at it, but Ino still smiled as she dipped into the chocolates her father snacked on while writing reports. It was only proper to pay a summons when asked.

Ino opened Naruto’s letter.

It was about a quarter of the way in she started cursing herself a idiot.

* * *

When Jiraiya noted Naruto freezing in her tracts, he looked up.

“Ryu,” he said, keeping his voice neutral.

But Tani Ryu payed the sage no mind. He kept his eye on the girl before him.

The plan was to politely offer his package, apologize, turn, and go, escorting at a distance.

But now that he knew, and was face to face with her...

He sank to one knee in front of the blond genin.

“You have your father’s eyes-- how did I not-- and your mother’s face...”

That face was puzzled, a little nervous... and was there a bit of hope there? “You... shaved your head, Anata-san.”

Ryu managed to smile. “Hai. I wore it this way when I was a genin, until... just after the Kyuubi attacked.”

“Oh,” the girl said, and he could see the confusion, the wondering what to do now in her eyes, the way her mouth couldn’t settle on an expression, her furrowed brow.

“That day... we lost so many good nins,” Tani said.

Naruto bit her lip. “Iruka-sensei lost his family...”

“Yes. Sarutobi-sama-- his wife was helping your mother deliver you. We lost her. The Hyuuga lost a great many people from both houses.” And here was the hard part. “My team mate, Ai,” he said, finding he needed to explain, owed her one, “She and I were engaged. She died fighting it.”

And now, sadness. Lip trembling. He had to finish before he broke down with her.

“And my team mate and his wife... died sealing it up. I only just found out who they--”

He was nearly knocked over when she flew at him. At first he relaxed to take the attack he deserved, but then he found that his friend Minato’s daughter was clinging to him, hugging him, babbling like mad.

“I’m sorry! I mean, I didn’t do it, but I understand! You must miss them so much! I didn’t even know my daddy was anyone until recently and I know the Hokage hid it to protect me, so you didn’t know and it’s okay, you were just hurting!”

Tani Ryu hugged his team mate’s daughter back and met his Sensei’s eyes. He knew he must look almost as out of it as when he was drowning in sake.

For the first time in years, Jiraiya-sensei looked proud of him. And Tsunade-sama was giving him that look-- oh, kami-sama, he was going to be tough mothered to an inch of his life, full medical and all!

“I’m... Tani Ryu,” he managed around the lump in his throat.

The girl leaned back, lip jutted out. “Tani Ryu. Ryu-niisan,” she tried, and then frowned-- Minato! his brain finally noticed. Then, her eyes lit up, with a small smile-- Kushina! -- and she declared, “Taniisan!” Then, she frowned. “Jirai-jiji didn’t mention you when he was talking about mom and dad’s friends, Taniisan...”

Ryu managed to smirk. “That’s because I’ve been busy being a horrible old drunk for several years, and your godfather knew it would be unwise to interrupt me until I was done.”

The girl chuckled. Her mother was a chuckler rather than a giggler as well. Then he was being dragged to his feet, being introduced to a bemused pair of twins, a cool and composed fiance, a team mate trying to be as cool, and another one eying him warily.

“And... oh, you likely know Sensei...”

Kikashi’s eyes tipped him off to the jounin’s smile, and he had to restrain from frowning as his best friend’s only remaining student bowed far lower than Ryu ever deserved. “Tani-san.”

Giving a polite bow in turn, Ryu held out the Hokage’s missive. He smiled as Kakashi broke the seals. “I am to accompany you the rest of the way home, Kakashi-kun. No doubt to insure you don’t run into a lost cat that, it turns out, can talk. Or a boy drowning in a cursed well. Or a team of genin with their specially trained attack pets...”

The jounin-sensei looked up from reading the Hokage’s note. “Did... you read my mail? Because it’s bad enough when Ero-sama does it.”

“Hey!”

“Oh, Jiraiya, just let it go,” Tsunade said.

“No, why?” Ryu asked. “Does the Hokage remember your lamest hits too?”

“He tried to tell us he ran into Son Goku earlier,” Naruto groused. “Honestly!”

“Right,” Kakashi said, crisply. “Come kawaii genin and hangers on--”

“Oi! My betrothed is **not** a hanger on!”

“Thank you, Naruko.”

“The twins, maybe,” the girl mused.

“I need to behave,” one of said twins started chanting, to the other’s amusement.

“--onward to Konoha!” Kakashi finished, pulling out a book as a lineup formed, with Sakura taking up a position behind their guests and Sasuke in front, and the Legendary Duo in the rear. Ryu had heard rumors that Kakashi was being a bit too lax training his genin, but he saw none of that now. Though Naruto seemed to have her mother’s issue with stillness...

Ryu frowned at Kakashi’s reading. “That’s... have you changed that much?”

Kakashi looked at the cover of Gutsy Shinobi Takes All. “I am defending Jiraiya-sama’s perception of his god daughter.”

Ryu slowly smiled. “Minato, or Kushina?” he murmured.

“She’s worse than either of them,” Kakashi confided.

“I don’t see how...”

“She made a jutsu called _Sexy Jutsu_. It knocked the Professor out due to blood loss. It has a Harem variant.”

Tani Ryu was torn a moment, then burst out laughing.

He would explain why to no one as they headed back to Konoha.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some notes from the process:
> 
> I went with "Citizen Council". Originally I looked up civilian-- as most fics that use the council fanon call it such-- but the Japanese words for that have the connotation of “Non governmental person”. Not what I wanted. So Citizen Council it is.
> 
> And yes, I freely admit-- the whole council thing is fanon. It's useful here.
> 
> I originally used more Japanese terms, but a native speaker said she'd prefer I write as clearly as possible-- so use my native language. She also liked how I used both translations of Naruto's verbal tic, so I'm doing something right.
> 
> I oblige, though I continue to use Japanese names and honorific as needed. Teme and Dobe, being rude forms of you, are now replaced by Bastard and Dead-last.
> 
> Hyuuga Yachi is on loan from Evil Genus.
> 
> Bunke is a branch family, Souke the main house.
> 
> I think "The Inky Darkness" suits Sai, here the adopted son of Danzou-- the Darkness of the Shinobi.
> 
> As Genus noted in editing, Hiruzen really prefers being seen as the Professor rather than Hokage-sama. That makes him fun to bother.

**Author's Note:**

> BOUNTY: You dyslexic author appreciates any help with typos. thegovernancedropbox@gmail.com is my contact point. Omakes and cameos in thanks.
> 
> Finally settled on the spellings used in Archive Of Our Own's character tagging for canon things. Will be tweaking this and Open Cocoon to reflect this as we go.


End file.
